


Tomorrow

by RenkonNairu



Series: Day Away [4]
Category: DCU (Comics), Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Drama, Dystopia, Gen, M/M, Melodrama, No Actual Slash, Post-Slash, Pre-Slash, Time Travel, combination of different show canons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-11
Updated: 2012-10-18
Packaged: 2017-11-16 03:07:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 40,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/534802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RenkonNairu/pseuds/RenkonNairu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Season 2, Future AU<br/>Superboy and Robin are transported to Bart's future, and they discover its not the shiny, happy place he described. (Original -Just Us- boys .)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Lets Do the Time Warp

There are people in this world –and outside it- that always seem to know everything. More than the bat-clan or even their Commander ever could. Travelers who move in and out of time like sharks in the sea. But unlike Samson and Atlas, these are harmless observers –or, at least, they endeavor to be harmless observers. They're the Linear Men, and at the moment, one of them is very annoyed.

"You are well aware of my vows to protect the timestream, Superman." Waverider, formerly Matthew Ryder, youngest member of the Linear Men crossed his arms over his chest. "Don't get me wrong, I sympathize with your position. But I can't. The rules are very clear."

The Superman grit his teeth in annoyance. His unearthly crystal-blue eyes narrowed at the time traveler as the Man of Tomorrow considered crushing him for always being so insufferably rigid. "Its not like I'm asking you to re-order time and move the start or whatever. Just leave the kids alone. I'd think it would fit in nicely with your vow of non-interference. Why'd you even bother coming here in the first place, if your answer was gonna be 'no'?"

"'Kids'?" Waverider echoed. "I'm only interested in one kid. As to why I bothered answering your little summons…" he shrugged, "…I guess I just like seeing that pretty teenaged face of yours up close."

That was it. The Superman's notoriously short patience ran out and he threw up a telekinetic field around the Linear Man, drawing it in, squeezing it tighter, intending to crush him for his insolence. But the time traveler had already gone, disappeared back to Vanishing Point, their base in the time-space vortex. Without even an 'Allonz-y!' to announce his departure.

The Superman's perpetually young face contorted with displeasure.

.

tick-tock

.  
40 Years Earlier…

Timothy Drake raised an eyebrow at his friend's costume. Well, Kon did say he would never guess what he was going as. Originally the little Robin assumed that was because the Superboy hadn't yet decided what his costume would be. He had not imagined the demi-kryptonian would dress-up like that.

"So, let me get his strait," Tim began, crossing his arms over his chest, creasing the flower embroidered on crimson fabric of his tunic. "For Halloween, you're going as an inmate from Stryker's Island?"

"What?" Kon blinked his unearthly crystal-blue eyes at his friend. His perpetually young face showing only blank confusion. "No! I'm supposed to be Luke Skywalker. Ya know, farm kid with telekinetic powers."

Tim only raised the other eyebrow. "Kon, you're wearing an orange jumpsuit."

"Flightsuit." Corrected the Superboy. "Its an X-Wing pilot flightsuit. Superman helped me make it. Seriously, Tim, how can you not get this? See my lightsaber?" He pulled a plastic toy lightsaber from his belt. With a dramatic swing of his arm the blade was extended and a flick of his thumb had it suddenly glowing a subdued blue. "And my helmet. I've got the symbols for the Rebel Alliance on it, for cripes sake!"

They stood in the Cave's common room. The Team decided that, since all their respective mentors would be needing their side-kicks' support on the actual night of Halloween (Batman especially, Halloween in Gotham was the sort of thing that gave people's nightmares nightmares), that they all get together and have a small Haloween bash the week before.

Wonder Girl wandered over to them. Dressed in a long pink gown, her golden hair tumbling down her back and a dainty gold crown bearing the Disney logo and a bust of Princess Aurora atop her head. She pulled the little Robin into a headlock and gave him a non-super-strength noogy. "And what are you supposed to be, Boy Wonder?"

"Cass! Get off!" He wriggled out of her grip and climbed onto the back of the couch. Perching there for no other reason than dramatic flair, he began, "What am I for Halloween? Dear lady, 'they seek him here; they seek him there. Those Frenchies seek him everywhere. Is he in Heaven? Or is he in Hell? That damned, illusive, Pimpernel!'"

The whole Team turned to stare at him. Mostly because he was standing on the back of the couch, effectively making himself the tallest thing in the room, but also a bit because no one understood the limerick that had just come out of his mouth.

"So… what are you?" La'gaan asked in confusion.

Tim sagged with exasperation. Then, as if it should have been the most obvious thing in the world, "The Scarlet Pimpernel."

"Que es este?" Asked Blue Beetle, whom had gone for the traditional Frankenstein's Monster look this year.

"Seriously? Don't you people read!?" The Robin hopped down from the couch in disappointment. From his normal height of five foot two he explained, "The Scarlet Pimpernel was the title character in the novel written by the Baroness Orczy in 1903. The book takes place in 1792 during the French Reign of Terror. The Scarlet Pimpernel was an English nobleman who rescued people from the Guillotine before they could be killed. He was the first ever 'masked hero'."

Now it was Superboy's turn to put the Boy Wonder in a headlock. "You are such a little nerd."

"Hey now! Nerds are totally crash!"

Before Kon knew what was happening a blue blur appeared by his side, disentangled the Robin and then draped both its arm over their shoulders.

"Hello, Bart." They groaned. "What are you supposed to be?"

"I'm Sonic the Hedgehog, duh!" Smiled the speedster as if this should have been obvious. He did not look a thing like the anthropomorphic blue hedgehog. "Anyway, we should totally hang out! Just us three. I've always wondered what the Junior Finest were like back when they were actually the Junior Finest."

"What do we become when we're no longer the 'Junior Finest'?" Tim asked.

"Never you mind." Impulse waggled a finger in the young Robin's face. As if to say, 'uh-uh, spoilers'.

As if he hadn't run around throwing out secret identities like they were party favors when he first showed up from the future. A past-watching vacation. Ha! Tim didn't buy that load for a second. No, there was another reason for the speedster's journey to the past, of that Tim was sure. He thought it probably had something to do with the Flash since he'd zoomed off to Central City almost as soon as he'd confirmed that it was indeed the year 2016. But now his fixation on his paternal grandfather had tapered off, the time-traveling speedster's attention instead turning to Superboy and Robin.

"Obviously, we must become the World's Finest." Kon offered. "You probably takeover the mantel of Batman instead of Nightwing and I become the next Superman."

Tim's glare failed to reach the demi-kryptonian as Bart's chin was in the way. He had no desire to become Batman. Let Dick have it. With his obnoxiously lighthearted disposition he could probably handle the weight of the cowl better anyway.

"Oh, lets not talk about the future." Impulse straitened, no longer hanging off them and instead gave each a slap on the back. "The future is totally boring. Lets talk about right now. I want some candy!"

May the gods help those who give candy to Bart Allen.

.

tick-tock

.

In Vanishing Point there is no 'future'. There is no 'past'. There is no 'now'. It exists outside of the timestream in the space between the 'tick' and the 'tock' of a clock's cogs. In the pause between breaths. The blink of an eye. Outside of time, yet always right along side it.

Anyone who exists within Vanishing point can see any moment in history through windows that access the ages. For the Linear Men whom live in Vanishing Point, time is their subject of study, its orderly flow their mandate. One might call them 'guardians' of a sort, ensuring that time's passage is never disrupted.

But, really, when one really gets down to it and examines them critically, the Linear Men seem nothing more than glorified nationhood watchmen with phenomenal god-like powers. For all their knowledge of history and abilities to travel through time, watch time, and anticipate events before they happen, they failed to notice something.

Time had already been altered.

Barry Allen, the second man to carry the name 'the Flash' was supposed to have died on February the 28, 2016. But he did not. He failed to meet his end due to the interference of his grandson, Bart Allen –Impulse. But young Bart was not even supposed to have been born yet at that time. His father hadn't even been born yet at that time.

Humans really were amazing creatures. Waverider had to admit. Whether they been meta-human, normal-human or 'human' in name only, it could not diminish the fact that they were clever, creative and stubborn. The were creatures that refused to give up. Refused to accept things as they were if what they were was adverse to the human experience as a whole. They adapted. They fought. They created imaginative ways to achieve their ends.

The ends of the people of 2056 were to change their reality. To do so, they created the first ever working time machine and sent Bart Allen backwards forty years to save the life of the Flash. To alter an event that they identified as the catalyst that started the chain of events that lead to their present.

The actions were already taken. The event already changed. But time is a funny thing. Like the flapping of a butterfly's wings in south Cambodia can start a hurricane in the Caribbean Sea, so too can the changing of one small event lead to a large and strikingly different future, but just because its different doesn't mean it's the future one has hoped for. Bart Allen would have to learn this the hard way.

He was an individual out of his own time and it was Waverider's job as a Linear Man to return him to his right and proper decade –even if that decade was not the one from which he had originally come.

.

tick-tock

.

May the gods have mercy on those who give candy to Bart Allen. …Because Superboy certainly won't!

He and Robin were tasked with the onerous job of catching the hyper-active speedster and bringing him back into the Cave. They jogged through the naked trees that covered Mount Justice trying to get a bead on the impossibly fast, impossibly infuriating, little speedster.

"There!" Tim pointed at a flash of blue through the trees. But the moment he said it, he was already gone. "No, there! There! Damn it, Bart!"

"There's an easier way to do this." Kon groaned, pulling off the black gloves of his X-Wing pilot's suit.

The Superboy laid his palms flat on the ground, stretching out with his tactile telekinesis, feeling for the near super-sonic patter of Impulse's bright red Sonic the Hedgehog sneakers. It felt like what Kon always imagined water felt like when an inconsiderate speedboat went zooming over it. The moment the demi-kryptonian felt the speedster step on his field, he pulled the TTK out from under him, rather like pulling a carpet from beneath someone's feet, and Impulse went tumbling face-first into the dirt.

Or, at least, he would have, had Kon not snapped his TTK around him like a bubble.

The so-called 'Junior Finest' picked their way through the trees to where Bart hovered in the air, suspended by the Superboy's telekinesis.

He crossed his arms over his chest, looking peeved. "No fair! You used super-tricks."

"Hey, if it works." Robin shrugged at the demi-kryptonian's side. "Now lets get you back inside."

"But I don't wanna!" Bart wined, sounding far younger than the sixteen years that he was. He began to vibrate his whole body.

"Nice try." Kon scoffed. "But my TTK isn't solid. You can't vibrate through it 'cause there's nothing to vibrate through."

Impulse appeared not to be listening. A few moment's later, the Superboy's hands began to shake.

"Hey! What that-!?" He grit his teeth and refocused his telekinetic power.

Somehow, in his sugar over-dose induced high, Bart had managed to find a way to, rather than vibrate through Kon's TTK field, instead vibrate on a similar but opposing wavelength. It felt almost like an echo and sent odd tingling waves up the Superboy's arms. Finally, his concentration broke, his whole body feeling tingly like pins and needles all over. The TK field holding Bart vanished and the Impulse was once again free to wreak havoc. He sped off without a moment's pause.

"Damn it, Kon!" Tim sprinted after him, as if he had any hopes of catching up.

.

tick-tock

.

Waverider was in a forest. He didn't materialize there. Or aparate. Or teleport. He wasn't there, and then suddenly he was. As if taking a step between the ticks of the clock.

"Nice try. But my TTK isn't solid. You can't vibrate through it 'cause there's nothing to vibrate through. Hey! What that-!?"

…And it sounded like his quarry would be appearing in three… two… one…

"Whoa! Who're you?" The boy blinked up at Waveider with a keen inquisitive interest that was only slightly darkened by wary suspicion –the only evidence of the home-time from which he'd come.

"I'm a Linear Man." He said. "A guardian of time, and you… are a disrupter of the timestream."

Impulse's eyes flash with sudden recognition that he was in a possibly dangerous situation. "Mode." He muttered. "Time to jet!"

But with a flick of the wrist unseen by the speedster, Waverider froze Bart in his steps. His body, his position, became a fixed point in time. Unchangeable. Immobile. Until he was released by the Linear Man that froze him.

"What that-!?" Bart tried to move but found he was unable. "What'd you do to me!? This is totally mode!"

"I've come to return you to your proper place in time." Waverider informed him.

It was then that the current Boy Wonder came tumbling through the trees after the wayward speedster. "Kon, I found hi- Who're you!?"

"Tim, this is Linearman. Linearman, this is Robin." The speedster supplied casually, as if he weren't frozen in time and unable to do anything besides breath and speak. "Linearman is kinda holding me prisoner somehow. I think a bit of a rescue is in order. Would you mind?"

"On it." And the Boy Wonder suddenly had his bo-staff in hand. "Superboy! Defense!"

A crackle in the air and sudden halting of the autumn breeze indicated that Kon had snapped a telekinetic shield around them. A few seconds after that the demi-kryptonian appeared from out of the trees, completing the trio. "I heard what Bart said."

Waverider regarded the Junior Finest for a moment, remembering his conversation with Superman. "Oh! Now I get it! Wow, I'm slow."

The trio might have blinked in confusion at this random and seemingly non-senseical babble if they had had time to. But 'time' suddenly became an ambiguous concept for them as the woods around Mount Justice suddenly… -weren't there anymore. They didn't fade, or melt, or dissolve, or do any of the other common visual effects seen when teleporting. One moment they were in the woods and then in less 'time' than it takes to blink an eye they weren't anymore.

.

tick-

.

The leader of the Linear Men crossed his arms over his chest in irritation. "You were supposed to return the disruptive factor to his own time. Not send two others with him."

"I know." Nodded Waverider. "But I had to do it this way, because that's the way it happened."

.

-tock

.

A light gray snow was falling all around them. It piled on top of Kon's TK field and trickled down the sides in halting tumbles. The clouds from which it fell were thick and dark, but not at all natural looking –at least, not natural for weather. It seemed more like the billows of a volcanic eruption or the lingering debris cloud of a planet-killing meteor.

Around them, the land looked as dead and lifeless as they sky. They stood in the bowl of what could only have been a crater. The landscape around them might have been mountainous or hilly at one point in time, but it was pot marked with craters similar to the one in-which they now huddled, almost as if it had been bombarded from the air. …Or from space. To the east of them a forlorn gray sea churned with listless waves.

"What just happened?" Asked the demi-kryptonian, not daring to lower his TK field even for a moment. For all he knew, the air was poisonous. "Where are we?"

"What is this..?" Tim ran a hand down the barrier, following a trail of the light gray snow as it tumbled down the dome. "Its not cold enough to be snow…"

"Its ash." Bart gave a sober whisper.

Neither of them had ever heard the speedster sound so serious before. They were so used to Impulse be, well, impulsive. It was a little disorienting to see him now, sitting down in the dirt, having regained control of his body, drawing his knees up and wrapping his arms around them. He gazed out over the slate colored sea, looking at it, but not really seeing it, his mind instead turned inwards.

"How could you possibly know that?" Kon asked.

"Because…" He tore his eyes from the sea and stood. "Because this is where I'm from." Waving his arms in a wide arch to indicate the world around him. "This is my present and your guy's future!" Then a begrudging growl. "I'm home."

They stared at him for a moment. Behind his Scarlet Pimpernel mask, Tim's eyes narrowed at the speedster. He had never believed that story about past-watching vacations, visiting relatives back when they were young and spry… or still alive. It was a nice little fairy tale, but would never work when it came to practical application. This future didn't even look like it could have provided time travel for something as frivolous as a vacation. No, this future looked too desperate. There was probably no such thing as a 'vacation' here.

That left the Robin to speculate as to the true reasons for young Bart Allen's true objectives in traveling to the past.

"This does not look like the future you described to us." Kon crossed his arms over his chest.

Thank you, Captain Obvious. Tim tried not to roll his eyes. To spite of his Cadmus programming, the kryptonian clone did not have his skills and training when it came to analytical thinking and deductive reasoning. Instead of reprimanding the Superboy for not being his intellectual equal, the Robin instead turned his attention to studying their landscape; shelter and clean water, those were his new priorities. Then interrogate Bart and figure out a way back to their own time.

"I lied, okay?!" Impulse snapped.

"But, why?" Continued the demi-kryptonian. "I don't get it. Why'd you come back to our time in the first place?"

At that question, Tim turned back to his companions, presuming enough to answer for the speedster. "Obviously, 'cause his time was so crappy he thought that if he could travel back to the past and change it things would be better."

Bart nodded. "That was the plan." He spread his arms wide again. "But it didn't work! Everything's still the same."

"Of course it didn't work." Tim scoffed at the very idea. "Haven't you ever read anything by Rene Barjavel? If you had succeeded in changing anything, then you would have had no reason to come back, so you wouldn't have, so nothing would have changed."

"Wha?"

"Huh?"

Both Bart and Kon looked as if Tim had somehow slipped into a foreign language. They gaped at him blankly. Tim sighed heavily. Sometimes he really felt just a little to bookish for his particular social circle.

"It's a paradox, Bart." He tried to explain. "A contradiction. No matter how many times I repeat myself, it won't change. At best, you could achieve a 'self-fulfilling prophesy'."

Bart's eyes fell downcast. As if the Robin's words had stabbed at a point he had already considered and feared was true. Stabbed that fear and dragged it out into the light, cast it at his feet and said, 'Here! This is it, its hopeless!'

Kon, on the other hand, looked like Tim's words had thrown him into a fog. He frowned as he thought, the gears in his head turning. Finally he said, "Damn. That's a bit heavy for me." And began to run through some basic yoga poses. After a bit, he continued, "But the main point we need to focus on right now is getting Tim and I back to our own time."

"Priorities." Tim nodded. "First, we get out of the open. Find shelter. Then we understand our situation. Bart, you are going to tell us everything you possibly can without revealing to much of our personal futures. Once we know the full scope of our position, we can start exploring our options. Agreed?"

They both nodded.

"Alright then. Bart, where are we?"

"Uh… the Cave. This… this crater is Mount Justice."

"Bullshit!" Kon exclaimed.

"No, its true." Insisted Bart. "When you travel through time, you stay in the same spot and time moves around you."

"Like in H.G. Wells' The Time Machine." Tim nodded. He took another long look at the landscape around him, pot marked by craters as if bombarded from space. He was not looking forward to seeing this event unfold in his own future (assuming they could return to their own time), but he filed those thoughts away for later study. At the moment it was crucial to stay focused on the here and now.

"But how can this be the Cave!?" The demi-kryptonian pressed. "I mean –my, god! What happened!?"

"One crisis at a time." Tim told him. "First we find safe ground and get out of this ash. Then we have our expositional onslaught. Bart, pick a direction."

Without any sort of warning, Kon took to the air, and since they were both still inside his TTK field, both Tim and Bart came along for the ride. They shot up to just above where the mountain's peak would have been had there still been a mountain there. Kon looked up and down the coast, recognizing it jagged edge, the inlet of the Happy Harbor bay, the ruins of the town proper, the small cove that hid the beach where the Team liked to swim and Kon liked to sun-bath. There was doubt about it, this was the little bit of coast on which Mount Justice rested, only there was no Mount Justice anymore. Now it was just the 'Justice Crater'.

"Its true. This is…"

"What the fuck do you think you're doing!?" Bart snarled at the demi-kryptonian. "Get down! Do you have any idea how much we stick out, Mr. Bright Orange Jumpsuit!?"

"What?" Kon blinked in confusion, one hand going to tug at the top of his bright orange X-Wing pilot's costume.

"Kon, do as he says." Tim could feel himself slipping into battle-ready mode, thought he could see no clear danger. He hadn't liked being out and exposed on the ground, at the time he just chalked it up to bat-paranoia. But up here in the air, up here even more exposed and attention grabbing in their bright orange and red and blue costumes. Tim didn't just feel exposed, he felt like a target. "We're forty years removed from everything we know. The rules are changed and we need to learn the new ones before we can make moves like this."

"But, look at-"

"No!" The Robin snapped. "First we need to understand. Then we act. Not the other way around. Just do as I say and we'll get through this."

"Can we please continue this argument from the ground?" Bart begged, sounding almost as if he were about to descend into a panic. Tim took special note of his tone and infractions to go over late when he had some time to himself.

"Okay, fine."

They began to descend at a steadily controlled pace. Just fast enough to satisfy Bart, but no where near fast enough to cause the two non-kryptonians any damage upon landing. They were only a few feet from the crater floor when the attack came.

A bolt of energy from the sky. It came at them from an angle, so it wasn't a space-born weapon, and when the trio turned to look, they saw floating in the sky, a woman. Very beautiful, even from this distance, to spite being in her mid to late thirties. Wearing a scant costume in shades of purple, bikini-cut bottoms with an airy peasant-style top. The lavender and violets of her outfit created a stark contrast to her golden skin. She cut an almost perfect hourglass of a figure, just about any female any of them knew would have been deathly jealous. Dark hair billowing behind her like a cloud, green eyes almost glowing as she glared down at them, she spoke.

"That was a warning shot." She called. "You are outside of the designated habitable zone. Surrender quietly and submit to interrogation."

"She sound's friendly." Kon commented dryly.

"Run!" Bart hissed. …And then he was gone.

Tim, always quick to process a situation hopped onto the demi-kryptonian's back and muttered a short, "Move!"

Kon wrapped his arms around the Robin's legs, enveloped them both in his TK field and then shot off as fast as his tactile telekinesis could move them. He was nowhere near as quick as Impulse, but he did put a good deal of distance between themselves and the mysterious woman very quickly.

Bart appeared by his side, slowing down just enough to match the demi-kryptonian's speed.

"Okay," Tim began, shouting to be heard over the wind vortex they created. "Maybe we can have a little explanation before we find cover. Who was that and what's going on?"

"That was Nightstar." Bart said. "And what's going on is we're getting our asses out of here before she either fries us or drags us back to her Commander."

.

tick-tock

.


	2. Its Just a Jump to the Left

A flash of silver steel in dim light.

A splash of blood, flowing freely from an opened well in the chest.

With a start he jolted awake.

Groaning, the bat-clan's Commander pressed the heels of his hands to his forehead and heaved a heavy sigh. Just a dream –technically a nightmare. Well, a nightmare by most people's standards, for a citizen of the Gotham Territory and a veteran of Old Gotham City before that it was just a dream. More specifically a dream of a memory. A memory of an event that had not yet happened –at least, not on this end of the timestream. The Commander slithered one hand under his pillow to touch the bo-staff he'd layed there just before going to bed. He always kept it close. Like a best friend, one that wouldn't throw a bitch-fit and leave him for how he chose to cope. No. He wouldn't think of Superman right now. Not when there were other matters to weigh on his mind.

Heaving a second, heavier groan, the Commander rolled off his narrow bed and padded his way to the bathroom.

Bracing scar-torn hands on the sink, he glared at his reflection in the mirror. Stringy gray hair hung in his face and the Commander ran a hand through it in an attempt to bring it back under some semblance of control. He glared at his reflection, blue eyes studying the face that he sometimes forgot to recognize as his own. The eye were still bright and keen and rarely missed anything, but the face they were set in was now wrinkled and creased with far to many frown lines and far to few smiles.

He had been a Robin, and he had been a Batman, now at the age of fifty-four he was the Commander. One would think he might consider himself lucky to have not only managed to survive the Light's meta-sapien soldiers, Apokolips' invasion, the deaths of over half the Justice League and Team, and all the civil wars that followed –especially with no powers of his own and nothing but his wits and a belt full of gadgets to carry him through. But the Commander didn't believe in luck. If he ever did, he certainly didn't anymore. The Commander made his own luck.

Of course, he also had a bit of an unfair advantage. The Commander knew his future. Well… the major events. There were some things that still managed to take him by surprise. But the big Earth-shattering events and major personal events he had a fairly decent mental outline for. Most notable of which was his own death –his own death at the age of fifty-four. Soon, now…

But damn it all to hell if he wasn't going to go down fighting!

A knock on the bathroom door drew his attention. He kept a batarand taped to the underside of the sink, and another one behind the toilet. Never allow yourself a moment's vulnerability, he always told himself and those whom worked under him. Even if they do catch you literally with your pants down, don't let them catch you with your pants down. The 'rang was in his hand before the Commander even thought about it, arm raised, poised to strike should he need to. "State your name clearly!"

"Its me, Old Man." Came the familiar voice of a young man in his late teens through the old wooden door. "Terry."

McGinnis. The kid he was training as the new Batman. The Commander lowered his weapon but made no move to open the door. The boy knew his policy on disturbing him without a summons. "What do you want?"

"Just an update." Terry explained. "The Sentry system we salvaged from the old Watchtower picked up a temporal disturbance a few minuets ago. Mar'i already went to go check it out. She told me you'd want to know about it right away, even if I had to wake you up and dodge batarangs and bullets to do it."

The bullets comment was, of course, referring to the old glock pistol he carried with him on missions. It was the very same gun that had killed Bruce Wayne's parents all those years ago. Now it was repurposed, taking the lives of criminals rather than innocents. It was an idea that had struck the Commander in one of his rarer moments of dramatic flair. There was a kind of poetic justice in it.

His throat tightened at the words 'temporal disturbance'. He gripped the sides of the sink, remembering the flash of silver steel in dim light, the SHEEING of sliced air and spurt of fresh blood. White knuckled, throat dry, he managed to croak, "Where?"

"Forty-one point eight two three nine degrees north, by seventy-one point four one three three degrees west." Terry supplied, obediently.

"Rohde Island." The Commander growled. "The Justice Crater?"

"How'd you know?" The boy sounded genuinely surprised. "I guess that's why you're the Commander."

He took a few calming breaths. Things seemed to finally be coming full circle now. Instantly, the Commander's mind began to run through every possible detail that could be changed, every move he could make differently than what he remembered himself making the first time around. But then, that brought up the Barjavel Paradox. His mind instantly changed gears and began contemplating possible methods to counter a paradox.

That was the problem with time travel. Well… that was one of the problems with time travel. Most people liked to believe time traveled in a strait line. Like a train running on its track. A plus B equals C. But sometimes time could loop back or skip forward and then loop backwards again, folding in on itself more like a celtic knot, bobbing, weaving, always intertwining –connecting things that shouldn't be connected. Y equals M multiplied by X plus B. The problem is, if Y has already happened, then it doesn't matter what variable you assign to X or what action you change for M, they will all still come out to Y.

With a conscious effort, the Commander forced himself to relax his hands. Letting go of the cracked porcelain sink before he strained something. In an even, controlled voice, he asked, "Is the Comm-Set up and running today?"

"Yes…" Terry began slowly. "But the last magnetic storm knocked out a lot of the towers. The signal wouldn't be able to reach outside of the city. The short-wave is always working, though."

The Commander rolled his eyes and fought the urge to sigh. "And did Nightstar take a radio out with her?"

The other side of the door was silent one… two… three beats before the young Batman admitted, "I don't know."

This time the Commander did sigh. Sometimes it was hard to believe that this boy had been partially cloned from Bruce Wayne. "If she did take a radio with her, tell Nightstar to forget the trio and come strait home. If she didn't take one, then don't worry about her, she'll be fine. Page Rip Hunter and tell him I want a progress report on his Time-Sphere on my desk by o' nine hundred. After that, dust off the old teleprism and tell Superman we need to talk."

If the young Batman wondered why his Commander assumed Nightstar would find a 'trio' at the source of the temporal disturbance, he did not ask. Instead he focused on the rare order to not only use the little bit of kryptonian crystal-tech they had, but to also call the Fortress of Paradise. "He gets mad when I drop your name."

At that, the Commander smirked. They had once been great friends. The 'Finest' of friends some might say. But that was years ago. They were different people back then. But it was a true testament to just how close they had been to one another that the mere mention of the Commander's name could affect the Superman so. "Then drop it twice."

Of course… that same reason was why he'd forbidden Mar'i from ever speaking Superman's name within his earshot, and he'd never even allowed Terry to learn it.

.

tick-tock

.

Kon with Tim on his shoulders and Bart by his side going only maybe about half his top speed, did not stop until they were well into what had once been Pennsylvania. Finally pausing for breath and finding shelter under a partially collapsed overpass. What might have at one time been the junction of the 70 and 76 freeways.

"Are we safe now?" Asked the demi-kryptonian. He let the Boy Wonder slide off his shoulders before sagging with unfamiliar exhaustion, placing his fingers on his temples and massaging his head. He had had his tactile telekinesis for seven months thus far and while he did use it often, he hadn't really ever used it for such a solid block of time before. Clearly, some version of stamina training was in order.

"Well, no one's shooting at us." Tim observed. He might have been wearing his Halloween costume, but the little Robin was still a bat and always had his belt on him. From it he withdrew a pair of binoculars and began scanning the skies for any sign of a dark haired, gold skinned beauty with a 'shoot first and ask questions later' attitude. "And that Star-something chick doesn't seem to be following us."

"Nightstar." Bart corrected. "Yeah. They don't usually travel this far west. To hard to maintain."

"Maintain what?" Kon asked.

"The territory." Elaborated the speedster. "Everything between Providence, Rhode Island and Annapolis, Maryland is under the Commander's protection."

Tim pursed his lips in sudden consternation. For some reason, when Bart used the word 'protection' it couldn't help but sound like 'control'. But what worried the little Robin more was that right smack dab in the middle of that stretch of land would be Gotham, New Jersey. Bruce had always harbored some slight autocratic tendencies. He usually managed to keep them pretty well in check most of the time, but in a post-apocalyptic setting such as this, Tim could easily see him taking that little sidestep into full-blown autarch. Bruce would be in his late seventies by this time, he wouldn't be able to swing around as Batman anymore, but he could still fill the position of a 'Commander'.

"What about Metropolis?" Asked Kon. Delaware was nestled just inside the southern border Bart described.

"What about it?" The speedster shot back.

"Well, where's Superman?"

Bart's eyes darkened. "Superman's territory is the Fortress of Paradise City State, in Kansas."

And he said no more on that score.

Tim did not like the way the speedster had said 'Superman' either. More than that, he didn't like the image of this future Bart was painting either. It was starting to sound like the Justice League had carved up the country (possibly the continent, hell! possibly the world!) into a series of feudal states with a Leaguer ruling each territory. At least, that's what the Robin was inclined to deduce. He was more than happy to have his deductions proved wrong. After all, he was operating on incomplete information. But if it were true… Tim wasn't quite sure how he felt about that. Perhaps it made sense at the time? He just didn't understand enough of the current times or the events that lead to it.

Tim was ambivalent. He needed to know more before he could form a clear hypothesis.

"Okay, Bart, we need you to explain to us what happened to cause all this." Began the Boy Wonder. "Don't speak yet, we're gonna do this in baby steps. First, why is it raining ash?"

"It's the aftermath." The speedster began. "When Apokolips invades a planet, they do this totally mode thing where they try to make it like their own. They bore these shafts way down into he core of the planet, like one giant lava vent that spews directly from the molten core to the surface. Think of them as super-volcanoes uniformly spaced over the planet."

"Shit!" Kon exclaimed. "Why didn't the League stop them!?"

"They did! …Eventually. But…"

"But the damage had already been done." Tim finished for him.

"Yeah." Bart nodded soberly. "Most of the shafts are dormant now. Some of them have been plugged up completely and the pressure dispersed through lots of smaller channels. Nathan says the clouds are actually thinning a bit which is totally crash, but it'll be something like another fifty years before we see any natural sunlight again."

"No sun light!?" Needless to say, the Superboy was alarmed by this news.

"No natural sunlight." The speedster specified. "The places that've got power make their own UV lights for growing food and stuff."

That made sense, Tim nodded. No matter how the world changed around them, people would always need three basic things: clean water, food and shelter from the elements. To get food, no mater what kind of 'food' it was, they would need the sun. Whether it was from vegetation, animals that ate the vegetation, or animals that ate the animals that ate the vegetation… It all hinged on the sun's life-giving rays. If the Earth was blanketed in clouds that the sun couldn't penetrate, then people would just have to make their own sunlight. It made sense.

"What about the places that don't have power?" Kon asked.

Bart tensed ever so slightly before answering, "They either trade with the places that do –mostly scrap metal or whatever else can be salvaged from the old cities-, or they… get stuff through other means…"

"Marauding?" Tim offered.

The speedster nodded. "Basically."

"Tell me about the territories." Commander the Robin.

"After the Team and League crashed the mode and repelled the Apokoliptan invasion, the world was in pretty bad shape." Bart began slowly. "The governments had collapsed, there wasn't really any other body to step in and fill the vacuum. Most of the big cities were destroyed and a lot of the useable land kinda dead-ish. People and places that had resources became targets for those that didn't… There was fighting."

"War?"

"Yes." He nodded.

"Son of a bitch!" Kon exclaimed.

"After a while, certain members of… our community lets say, not necessarily League, not necessarily Team; they realized to maintain some version of peace they'd have to switch gears from masked avengers and shining heroes and become actual leaders. That's when the territories started forming. Superman built a new Fortress in Smallville; the commander started in Gotham and began expanding out along the coast until he reached the limit of the area he could actively maintain. Raven and Animal Man went out west, I think they're in California or something-"

"Who're Raven and Animal Man?" The Superboy blinked. They didn't know anyone by those names.

"Oh, right. That hasn't happened yet."

"Lets not get side-tracked." Tim tried to keep them on point. "Since they're so far away, I'm going to assume that they won't effect us all that much. What's communication like between the territories?"

"That's a tricky answer." Bart admitted. "The Commander's got a set of communication arrays that should be able to reach as far as the Mississippi, he calls it the Comm-Set. But every time there's a magnetic storm, almost all the towers go down. Superman gave out a few of these things he called 'teleprisms' to some of the traders that the Fortress of Paradise does business with. They're kryptonian crystal-tech and I have no idea how they work. Then there's always short-wave radios. They're the most reliable form of communication."

"Where did you fit in, in all of this?"

"I was with one of the nomad groups. We scavenged what we could from the cities and traded with the territories. Those of us with skills over even powers might have done a few odd jobs here and there. Whatever we could to get together the materials to build the Time Capsule."

"That's the thing you arrived in, right?" Asked Kon.

Tim rolled his eyes at so obvious an answer.

"Yeah."

Tim cut in. "So, since you were with a nomadic group, its safe to assume you know the lay of the land pretty well. Kon and I need to get back to our own time. Where should be start?"

Bart was silent a moment, thinking. Finally, he said, "DC. When we were building our first time machine we scavenged most of the zetta-tech we used from there. But we didn't take all of it. There might still be some usable parts there. There's also a coal-mining town not to far from there. I've traded with them before."

"Alright then." The Robin climbed back up onto the Superboy. "Lead the way."

It didn't take them long to reach Arlington. From there it was just a hop, skip and a jump to the Hall of Justice. They climbed the cracked and broken stairs, picking their way over up-turned concrete, protruding rebar, and the remnants of what might have been Abrams Tanks or alien war machines. The metal was so misshapen and discolored by age and weathering it was hard to tell. Certainly it didn't belong in a normal city.

The lobby doors (what was left of them) hung open, bent and dangling from half-broken hinges. Just inside, the statues of the Founding Seven members of the Justice League were just as broken and torn as the lawn outside, some even toppled over, laying as nothing more than shattered pieces on the ground. Kon saw this and couldn't help but be reminded of the training simulation Batman had put the Team through back in that first year. Had the Dark Knight known something like this was going to happen? Unlikely. But he certainly understood it was a possibility and just look at the world now. Looks like he was right. Where was Batman now? Kon wondered. Was he killed at some point in past forty years? Or was he still alive and kicking, maybe in Gotham, helping (or fighting) the mysterious 'Commander'?

Clark was still alive. Bart said he had a new Fortress in Kansas. What happened to his old one? Up in the arctic north. They had done most of their training there. What about Lois? Was she in Kansas with Clark, or had something happened to her in this laps of almost half a century?

The demi-kryptonian was startled from his thoughts by a loud, gurgling growl next to him. Kon looked up to see Bart had his hand pressed to his stomach.

"Sorry." The speedster smiled sheepishly. "I haven't eaten anything since we left the Cave."

"Of course." Sighed the Superboy. "How could we forget the appetite of a speedster." He wandered over to where there had once been vending machines up against a wall. In his own time they were always fully stocked with chips, candy bars, gum, soda… The machines still stood there, but they were near empty now, void of whatever snacks they might have held. Except for one that stood slightly tilted at an odd angle, hiding what looked like a Snickers. "Anybody got a buck?"

Tim walked right up to the machine and shoved his red-booted foot right through it. The glass shattered and the Boy Wonder pulled out the lone candy bar, tossing it to the Boy of Steel. "This is the end of the world, Kon. I don't think the American dollar's gonna mean much here."

"Oh. Uh, right." He turned and offered the bar to Bart.

"Uh, no thanks." He waved it off. "If it wasn't made by Hostes then it's not safe to eat."

"Hostes? Really?" Blinked the demi-kryptonian.

Tim just raised an eyebrow behind his Scarlet Pimpernel mask. "Do you know how many preservatives they shove in those things? I swear, cockroaches and Twinkies, they're the only things that could survive a nuclear bomb."

"Oh, I'd love a good Twinkie right now." Bart sighed.

"I bet you would…"

All three turned at the voice underlined by the familiar and distinct draw of a bowstring.

She had the high ground, perched atop the smooth remains of one of the fallen statues. Later thirties, more likely early forties, short black hair, eyes hidden by a domino mask, dressed head to tow in red and black. The bow in her hands was old and well used –and very familiar- but the string was new, the arrow homemade and fletch with nylone.

"Nobody comes to the Hall, unless they're looking for something." She said. "And I'm betting it's more than a candy bar. Now, who are you?"

"Red Arrow!" Bart smiled up at her. "Red, its me!"

The woman glared down at him, her eyes narrowing behind their domino mask. "I don't know anyone who dressed all in blue."

"Huh? Oh, right. The costume." He vanished for a split second, then reappeared at her side and plucked the arrow from her bow. "Sorry. It was Halloween back in 2016."

"What the-!" She exclaimed in shock. Then her mind processed. Super-speed… 2016… "Allen, damn you! How many time do I have to tell you not to do that!? You- you… you're supposed to be in the past! What are you doing back here!? And who are your friends? I've never seen their colors before. Can we trust them?"

"Sure, you can trust them." The speedster said matter-of-factly. "The orange one with the helmet and rose-tinted visor is Skywalker and the one in red with the flower in his chest is the Scarlet Pimpernel."

"Never heard of them."

.

tick-tock

.

Clark-Peter Ross, only child of Pete and Lana Ross navigated the narrow corridors of the Fortress of Paradise. Most of the city-state had been constructed from the remains of old Smallville and the weapons of both the former United States and the enemy. Wood frames, plaster or stucco interiors, armor plating on the exteriors. CP had just spent the past half-hour in front of the teleprism, ignoring other important tasks to tell the Batman in as many ways were humanly possible (some less polite than others) that Superman was unavailable. That the Man of Tomorrow had no desire to speak to the Commander or any of his underlings and so if this wasn't an emergency and the Earth was not about to be hit by a large meteor, or invaded by space-ninja vampires, then Superman had nothing to say.

At that point, the young Batman heaved an exasperated sigh and begged Clark-Peter than if he wouldn't go and get Superman, then could he please take a message? Fine. CP supposed he could do that. So, that was what brought him to this moment, stepping out of the dimly lit corridor out into an open field bathed in beautiful golden sunlight.

CP wasn't actually an errand boy. At the age of forty-one he was head engineer of the Fortress of Paradise. No one knew more about kryptonian crystal-tech except him and, of course, Superman himself. The name 'Fortress' was a misnomer.

It was really nothing more than a dome. One large, crystal bio-dome construction over the whole of the old Kent property and a few corners of the neighboring properties here and there (not that things like property lines mattered anymore). Atop the dome was the solar antenna, which relayed yellow solar radiation through or around obstacles it wouldn't have otherwise been able to bypass. It was what had allowed Clark to get sunlight at any time, day or night, back in his old Fortress, the Fortress of Solitude. Now, Superman used it to bypass the cloud-cover and pull life-giving sunlight directly into the dome and breath life into their fields. Almost every inch of ground inside the dome was devoted to food production, the area divided into fourths. One fourth for plating for eating, another fourth planting for other things (animal feed, medicine, ethanol), one fourth for animal grazing and the final fourth to be left fallow for rotation.

The city was built around the dome. Technically outside of it, room inside was to precious. But every building, every pathway, every corridor, every structure was paneled and armored.

Clark-Peter worked in the solar antenna. He was in the middle of training some of the younger technicians when the call came in on the teleprism. Calls on the prism were rare, most territories and traveling groups preferred the short-wave. So, CP had taken the opportunity to give boy a little tutorial on how to use the crystal-phone. He hadn't expected to get in an argument with the Commander's errand boy.

The fields were divided by four paths, all running from opposing points of the city to the center. There was only one thing in the center of the dome, the only thing not directly related to food production.

A house.

The dome was wide, and from far away it looked like little more than a shack. But as one draws nearer it becomes clear that it was at one time a very quaint farmhouse, the kind that only exists in stories. With a wide wooden porch and wicker furniture on the deck. However, it was not to this house that CP was headed. He turned off the path about half-way to it, hopping a corral fence and weaving his way between dull cows more preoccupied with chewing their cud. He found Superman kneeling over a downed heifer.

"Easy… easy, girl…" He whispered to the cow, one calming hand resting on the side of her head, the other over her swollen and pregnant belly.

It was sometimes had to believe that this… boy was the Man of Tomorrow. He looked so young. No older than sixteen. He didn't even shave! But then, he had always looked like that, for as log as Clark-Peter could remember… He wore old and faded jeans that had been patched and repaired so much, they barely looked like denim anymore. The colors of his shirt were so faded, the logo was almost unreadable as 'John Deer' anymore. That was fine, John Deer hadn't existed for many years now.

"Easy, girl. Its gonna be okay." He soothed and CP watched in awe as a cut appeared over the cow's belly as if cut by an invisible knife. Clark-Peter knew about the Superman's special power, but it was still eerily unnerving to watch it in action. The heifer began to struggle. "Hey, hey, hey, your baby's gonna be just fine."

"Want me to hold her?" Offered Clark-Peter.

"No. Stay where you are." The Superman commanded.

The invisible knife arched over her belly, giving the cut a distinct C shape and the next moment, Superman was pulled an infant calf from its mother's womb. Clark-Peter saw the problem instantly; the calf hadn't turned right and would have probably killed both mother and child to have been born naturally. It was lucky Superman caught it. Nobody liked to think about the consequences of lousing even one of the herd before it's appointed slaughter time. The calf climbed onto unsteady legs and Superman turned his attention to patching up the baby's mother. A needle stood at the ready, already threaded, stuck in a cushion in sitting on top of an old and well worn work-bag. CP watched mesmerized at the needled floated out of its cushion of its own accord and began to stitch up the Superman's surgery.

When it was over, he let the heifer go. Standing and replacing his needle and cushion back in the workbag which he threw over his shoulder. "What can I do for you, CP?"

"Batman called."

As expected, the Superman's eyes darkened just noticeably. One day, Clark-Peter promised himself he would work up the courage to ask what had happened between them. They were once Finest friends, now it seemed like they hated one another. Passionately.

"What does the Commander want?"

They turned and made their way over the field towards the house.

"Batman said the Commander had something important to tell you."

"The Commander thinks everything that comes out of his mouth is important."

Clark-Peter smiled to himself. "That's what I told Batman. But in the end I promised I'd pass on a message to you."

They were at the house now, the old Kent farmhouse. Superman held the door open for Clark-Peter.

"What was the message?" He asked, pulling an old dog-eared farmers' almanac off a shelf and flipping it open. Some of the pages were falling out and the spine was threatening to crack down the middle, but Superman seemed not to notice as he flicked through the pages.

"I'm supposed to tell you, in these words exactly, 'That thing that happened before has come full circle. I will need you at the end.'" Clark-Peter relayed obediently.

"Well that's horribly cryptic." Superman snorted.

"Batman said the Commander was sure you'd understand."

"Mm." Smiled the Man of Tomorrow. It was nice to see that the Commander still held such high opinions of his deduction and code-breaking skills. The problem was, there were so many things that happened to them before –back when they were still fiends- that were coming back to bite them in the asses now. It was hard to decide which thing he was talking about. …And then Superman turned to the page he was looking for and it hit him like a tone of bricks. Today was October the 24st. They hadn't celebrated it in over thirty years, but it was a week before Halloween! And it was 2056. The almanac slipped from his hands, the spine breaking on the floor, pages going everywhere.

It was amazing how time gets away from you. You live your life day to day and before you know it, forty years have passed…

Clark-Peter knelt down to pick up the pages.

"What is it? What's happened?" he asked. But when he lifted his head there was only empty air where the Superman had been standing.

A moment later, the Man of Tomorrow appeared in full colors. High-collar blue bodysuit, red boots, red belt, red cape. The S-shield bold on his chest in red and black over its background of blue. "CP, can you supervise the harvest in the west field for me? There's somewhere I've gotta be."

…And then he was gone.

.

tick-tock

.


	3. Then a Step to the Right

The woman, Red Arrow, lead the trio on a winding path through the broken city, keeping low, running with her knees bent, carefully picking a path over up-turned concrete, fallen street lights, collapsed bypasses and other less easily identifiable rubble. The former District of Colombia, Bart explained in a whisper, was right on the border of the Commander's territory and while he did technically claim it as his own (because he wanted access to the Hall, Pentagon, Anacostia-Bolling air and naval base, as well as a few other old USA resources), but the fact of the matter was that it was just to far away from his Territory Seat in Gotham to be maintained.

Bart seemed to talk about this Commander a lot. Of course, that could simply be because they had just escaped one of the Commander's operatives –the mysterious Nightstar- and were currently skirting the border of his territory. But Tim felt that there was a little bit more to the Commander than what the speedster was telling him. The problem was, the Boy Wonder was forty years removed from the situation and didn't know the current dialect of sub-text. He couldn't get a read on the figure of the Commander. He couldn't tell if he was malevolent or simply ambivalent. Tim decided it was safe to rule out benevolent –no one in this post-apocalyptic setting could afford to be benevolent.

After a while it became apparent that their path was taking a distinctive southward turn and Bart asked, "Are you taking us the long way to Mine Town Unincorporated? Because this sure as heck ain't the direct rout!"

Red Arrow did not turn when she replied, "As much as I would like to see Auntie Art and Uncle Cam, no. We've got a camp set-up not to far from here. The Demon's got us watching the fallen Watchtower. Apparently, Batman and Nightstar both have been in and out of the thing almost since you left –trying to salvage what they can for their Commander, no doubt."

There was so much information in the one reply that Tim almost froze in his tracks. If Kon, walking behind him, hadn't nearly tumbled into his back at the slight pause in step, he probably would have frozen.

"Woah!"

"Everything alright back there?" Red Arrow turned. The whited-out slits of her mask narrowing in suspicion.

"We're fine." Tim answered quickly –but not too quickly, that would have just raised suspicious, not alleviated it. "Skywalker just tripped over his feet. He's good now."

Kon, thank goodness, was smart enough to not say anything contradictory and he even waited until the woman had turned back around and resumed leading them out of the city before he asked Tim about it.

"Did you hear what she said?" Replied the Boy Wonder in a whisper in a voice so low only a kryptonian could hear it.

"Yeah, Watchtower fell out of the sky and they're trying to salvage it." Kon's whispered reply didn't sound impressed. Of course, with no one to maintain it, there were really only three things that could happen to the space station. One was that it would just float up there forever, one more disused satellite clogging the finite space around the planet. Second was that it would be flung out of orbit and lost in space forever. The third option was that its orbit would eventually decay over time and the station would fall back to Earth. The demi-kryptonian didn't really get what was so shocking about that.

"Yes," Tim hissed, "but more importantly, instead of rushing to salvage it these guys have staked it out and are watching others salvage it. What does that tell you?"

Kon was silent a moment, thinking. Then, "I donno, what's it supposed to tell me?"

Tim just sighed and shook his head. He knew Kon wasn't an idiot. In fact, the demi-kryptonian was rather smart, he had to be to be able to hold all that Cadmus programming that was still contained within his thick kryptonian skull. But sometimes… sometimes he could be so very, very dense.

Or maybe Tim was just expecting to much from him. The little Robin had learned long ago that his brain worked light-years faster than most people's. He noticed things and made connections that wouldn't otherwise be made between things. People, places, events. Hell! He had managed to figure out Batman's and the first Robin's identities just by piecing together newspaper clippings and looking at body-types in pictures for cripes sake!

So, while a normal person might hear that a group of people was observing a salvage instead of salvaging it themselves, they might not think much of it, or they might think they were just being curious, or nosy, or trying to stay informed. But in this end-of-the-world setting, where resources where scarce and all the more precious because of it, it told Tim something different entirely. Reasons why people watch other people? To catch them doing something incriminating, or to learn what they might be planning. Since the justice system in the time would be ambiguous at best, Tim decided on learning their plans. Why then, do people want to know other people's plans? Why, to ruin them, of course!

What it told Tim was that Bart's little group of nomads did not like the Commander and were scheming something against him.

Once again, he thought of Bruce. He would be seventy-seven by now –to old to be Batman. But Red Arrow said that 'Batman' was one of the ones working for the Commander. Was the 'Commander' Bruce then? The new 'Batman' Dick? Why would Bart and Red Arrow be at odds with them? And who was 'the Demon' she mentioned? The only person Tim knew about who sometimes went by 'the Demon' was Ra's al Ghul. But, no, no, no! He did not think Bart would team-up with him! Okay it was true, the Boy Wonder had only known the speedster from the future for a few months and a lot could happen in forty years. For all he knew, Ra's could be one of the good guys now.

'Not enough information.' He reminded himself. He didn't know enough to form any solid hypotheses. All he had were feelings and hunches. No concrete facts.

"Here we are." Red Arrow stopped in front of a pile of rubble that was near indistinguishable from every other pile of rubble in the area. Indistinguishable, up until she braced one foot on half a broken cinderblock, wrapped both her hands around a protruding copper pipe, and pulled. A segment of the pile swung up to reveal narrow passage slightly bigger than a manhole. "Allen, you go first. Then the new guys. I'll seal the door behind us."

And box them in between herself and however many others were hiding down that rabbit hole. Tim silently approved of her caution. It was the kind of security measure he imagined Bruce would instate –never show a stranger your back, especially not just within the open doorway of your own hideout.

Tim and Kon followed Bart down the passage, crawling because it was so small. It sloped at an angle, Tim would guess about thirty degrees –maybe less, it certainly wasn't more than that. After several feet, the passage opened out onto a wider passage. It looked like an old subway tunnel, but the track was stripped away, the service lights pulled from the walls, anything that could have conducted power or was made of metal was gone. Tim heard the draw of a bowstring behind him and looked to see Red Arrow with a bolt notched in her.

"Keep moving." She said. "That way. Bart can lead you."

"And you'll be watching our backs." He smirked.

"Very closely." She nodded without humor.

"You're so friendly and trusting." Kon remarked. "You remind me of someone I know back home."

Red Arrow was not impressed; she drew her bowstring tighter and fixed her aim squarely on his orange-clad chest. "For all I know, Skywalker, you could be a mole."

Kon shook his head, suppressing an amused smile. "Yup, definitely remind me of someone."

He turned around and they followed the speedster down the tunnel.

They turned at two different intersections, Bart leading them in the general direction of where he remembered the Watchtower had fallen before he left. Demon had talked about wanting to salvage the tower for the food and weapons; the dehydrated protein packets and fast-burn lazer canons. But it seemed like the Commander beat him to it. Oh, Demon must have just loved that! Man, was Bart glad he hadn't been around when that hit the fan.

Eventually, the tunnel led them to an old station. A dull amber light growing out of the dim. At first Tim thought it was torchlight, that the old service light fixtures had been converted into wall-scones and lit on fire. He then damned them for their stupidity to light fires in so enclosed a space, suck out all the oxygen and asphyxiate them all. Idiots!

But as they drew closer, Tim saw that it was not a series of fires, but just one small fire lit under a wheel. The rising heat from the fire spun the wheel like a turbine. From the makeshift turbine ran a wire and from the wire hung the dull amber lights that he had mistaken for torches. They flickered inconsistently like candles, but they lit the corridor and they burned no air. Tim nodded with silent approval. If they could spin a turbine, they could generate power, if they could generate power they had electricity. It really was amazing the things humans could achieve given sufficient motivation. He cast a sidelong glance at his half-alien friend; he doubted either Kon or Clark would have thought of it.

They followed the lights several feet to the station. A veritable tent city was erected on the platform, but before any of them could climb up from the non-existent tracks they were again stopped. Quite literally frozen in place.

A blast of frigid air hit their feet and Bart, Tim and Kon were all frozen in place, ice forming about their feet. Another woman stepped out from where she'd been lurking in the shadows. Her skin was as white as freshly fallen snow, but not in the charming 'fairy tale' kind of way. Her long hair, pulled back in a tight pony-tail at the nape of the neck and bushed out like a squirrel's tail, was an almost equally pale shade of blue. Even if she hadn't just frozen their feet in place, just looking at her told them 'ice-powers'! There was only one thing disorienting about her appearance (not to say that most things since they arrived in this time were disorienting, but this was the disorienting thing about her, specifically), she had Artemis' face!

This woman was the spitting image of their former Teammate Artemis Crock! That is, if Arty were an ice-user and about twenty years younger than she should be in this time.

"I don't recognize you three." She said in a voice that was almost Artemis' but slightly different. "You have three seconds to tell me who you are and what you want! 1…"

"Hi, Icicle." Bart mumbled as if greeting a lamentably familiar play-yard bully.

She blinked pale blue eyes at him. "Bart? What are you doing here? I though Nathan sent you to the past! Who're they?"

It was then that Red Arrow came up behind them. "Hey, Isa." She smiled. "I picked them up at the Hall. Bart says they're 'Skywalker' and the 'Scarlet Pimpernel'."

"Never heard of them." Icicle, whom looked like Artemis scoffed. She made a dramatic wave of her hand and the ice around their feet dissolved. "If Bart brought you, he can introduce you to the Demon. He likes to vet everyone before they join."

"Join?" Kon blinked at Ice-Artemis. "Join what?"

"Um, yeah… about that…" Bart muttered at his side.

Red Arrow hopped up onto the platform next to Icicle and spread her arms wide. "Gentleman," she said. "Welcome to the League of New Shadows!"

"Excuse me!?"

.

tick-tock

.

The Demon was not his chosen handle. It was a name derived from the titles 'the Demon's Grandson' and 'the Demon Child', which were given to him by the members of his father's household (and certain extended friends). He had been a Robin and he should be the Batman, the title was his by right. But it was denied him.

In his mid-thirties, some might view him as the allegorical exiled prince striving to reclaim his father's title and kingdom that were stolen from him. But the Demon did not entertain such romanticized and utterly absurd ideas. He was not a prince. His father had owned no kingdom. He was simply a man wanting to take back what was his.

At present, he was working towards doing exactly that. Meeting with his informant, the one operative he had in the usurper's household.

"Its lucky I was already out investigating something." Commented the Informant, green eyes bright and energetic as ever. The Demon would never say it out loud, he did not believe in wasting breath on frivolous statements of the obvious, but he thought those eyes were the most beautiful he'd ever seen. "Otherwise it might have been difficult to explain my absence to the Commander."

"I hate it when you call him that." The Demon growled in irritation but took her hand all the same. Intertwining his white-gloved fingers with her slender gold ones, he raised her hand and brushed his lips against it.

"Would you prefer I call him 'Uncle' around you instead?" The Informant smiled, full round lips curling upwards mockingly.

"Beloved, I wish you wouldn't delight in vexing me so." His voice was without infraction when he said this, but even if it went without auditory expression, his Informant could hear the mingled annoyance and affection behind it.

She heaved a heavy sigh. But the Demon couldn't tell if it was one of real and true exasperation with him, or an attempt to draw his attention to her very generous and admittedly perfectly shaped breasts. Neither would have surprised him, but in the end, the Demon decided that it didn't really matter. They had met here for a purpose and while he did begrudgingly admit that it was lamentable that they didn't get to see each other as much a they both would have liked, it was a necessary separation to achieve their goals. Goals that they should stay focused on and not allow themselves to be sidetracked by their baser impulses.

"Fine, fine. You're always so cold to me…" She pouted in a way that was –for lack of a better word- adorable, and the Demon committed the image to memory for later use when he was back at the New Shadows' base, in his tent –alone. Her pout was more for show than anything else, cute as it was, and she quickly abandoned it to give her report. "The Commander has had us salvaging zetta-field generators and space-displacement drivers from the Watchtower. Also, specific hard drives that contain software programs, most notable of which is the old Sentry program."

"I remember it." The Demon nodded. Then, "What does he want with the zetta-generators and S-D drivers?"

"He has this man working for him, making something." The Informant brushed a strand of long dark hair behind her ear and the Demon found himself suppressed the urge to close the space between them and stroke his own hands though her impossibly long cloud of hair. "They call it the Time-Sphere. And he's set-up the Sentry program in the Nest to only scan for temporal disturbances."

The Demon was silent a moment, processing this. It sounded like the Usurper was not only building a time machine of his own, but also trying to track other attempts at time travel as well. Thank goodness Neutron had already sent Allen to the past before all this started going down. Loath though he was to admit it, the Demon knew that the Usurper was clever and intelligent enough to stop their plans if he knew the full scope of them. Or… perhaps his sudden interest in time travel was a direct result of Allen's little trip back in time…?

In all honesty, the Demon had thought the idea was complete bunk when Neutron and the speedster first presented him with the plan. He only gave his consent for them to follow the project because it kept Allen out of his hair –something that was usually near impossible to do- and then, when they had succeeded in creating a working time capsule and Allen had gone back to the past it was like heaven had opened up, angels sang, and the Demon thanked the powers that were for finally ridding him of the nettlesome little nuisance. To be completely honest with himself, the Demon didn't care if the little speedster succeeded in his mission or not, he would be content if he never saw Bartholomew Allen the Second again.

"There's one more thing before I go." His Informant said, drawing the Demon from his thoughts. "Just today, the Sentry program picked up a temporal disturbance at the crater where the old Mount Justice base used to be."

"What?" He looked up, his dark blue eyes meeting her luminous and infinitely green ones.

"I went to check it out." She continued. "I found three people there. At first they were up in the air, surveying the area I guess; then they went to ground and sped off before I could get to them. They were all in colors but I didn't recognize any of them."

The Demon pursed his lips. New colors appearing out of the blue was cause for wary caution at any time. But now… when he was so close to realizing all his plans… The Demon saw the proverbial wrench and imagined it wasn't long before it got thrown. He would need to reexamine his stratagems and plan extra contingencies. Always more contingencies. If he leaned nothing else from his father it was that one must always plan for every contingency. You can't know what's going to happen, but that doesn't mean you can't still prepare for it.

"Is that all?" He asked.

"That's it." She nodded.

"Then… you should go before he starts to notice your absence." But the Demon did not let go of their intertwined fingers.

She floated a few inches in the air and gave his hand a light tug. "Was there anything else you wanted to say?"

He dropped her hand as if she'd given him an electric shock. "Don't be ridiculous!"

She smiled knowingly. No longer held by him, the Informant climbed in altitude, but paused again when he did finally add…

"And, Beloved… Mar'i, please be careful." The Demon gazed up at her with an expression most would believe was foreign to his face, but the Informant had seen it a remarkable number of times. The lamentable thing was that he caught himself to quickly and hid the expression all to soon. "Tt, it would be exceedingly inconvenient for my plans if he discovered you before my end-game."

Mar'i smiled down at him. "Same to you. It would be really annoying for me if anything happened to you, too."

"So, we have an understanding?"

"Oh, I think its safe to say I understand you better than most."

.

tick-tock

.

The Commander groaned at the jerk of the grapple line and the strain of muscles that were not as young and vigorous as they used to be. But to spite the burn in his tendons, the old man could not help but smile at the rush of air, yank of the line and pull of G-force. He delighted in the feeling of familiar motion. For one brief moment his eyes fixed on the horizon where the decaying towers of the city clawed up at the ever-bleak sky and he felt like it was many years earlier, on another night he had been swinging over the city…

'This is my flying!'

'Yeah, lets see if you still say that when your line snaps and you fall.'

'I won't fall. You're here to catch me. You always catch me.'

'And I always will.'

The Commander flicked the thumb trigger that would release the line just before the snap-back could pull him away from his intended rooftop. His landing was not as graceful or even as smooth as they had been in his youth, but grace and poise had stopped mattering a long time ago. Now all that mattered was that he made the landing unharmed and able to continue. …Because no one would catch him if he fell. Not anymore…

No! He would not think about Superman. It was by his own making that Superman wasn't here to catch him anymore, he hadn't been for a long time, and in the end… in the end he arrived to late to stop his fall. A flash of silvered steel in dim light. A spurt of fresh blood from an open well, dark and red. Backwards… falling backwards into strong arms clad in blue spandex… To late. All to late.

'My god! You knew this would happen?'

To late. He didn't catch him. Didn't stop his fall. Just held him in the final moments as darkness overtook him.

He didn't remember saying anything, but there was so much he wanted to say. Laying there in Superman's arms, bleeding all over that obnoxiously clean blue suit, his killer standing over them, sword reflecting the dim light… He didn't know it then –watching himself, he was to young, to inexperienced, hadn't yet gone through the life that lead to that moment, just didn't know, but there was so much he wanted to say. 'I forgive you.' 'I'm sorry.' 'I wish we were partners again.' 'I never told you, because you never listen, but…'

Damn it! He was thinking about him again! With a conscious effort the Commander forced his thoughts away from the Superman and how that obnoxiously young face had looked in the dim light.

'My god! You knew this would happen?'

Yes, Superman, he knew. And if you had been in the room with them, you would have known too. Maybe you would have shown up sooner, done something to help, maybe even prevent it…

Damn it! Stop! The Commander extended his collapsible bo-staff and vaulted to the next roof, then the next one after that. Familiar motion. A familiar city. Familiar tools. Hell, even a familiar mission, only viewed from the other side. Finally, he reached the building he wanted.

The old Gotham Gazette building. It was abandoned long ago during one of the civil wars after the Apokoliptan invasion was finally repulsed. It was stripped of anything useful by scavengers and sat dormant for almost a decade before the Commander met Rip Hunter.

Rip was not the type of person the Commander tended to trust. He was cryptic and secretive like most of the Commander's own bat-clan, but he hid it under a layer bizarre humor, goofy remarks and just overall a flippant attitude. But, the Commander remembered Rip from before, so while he was not the sort of person he usually tended to trust, he knew he could trust the man for at least the one thing he needed him for. The Commander commissioned him for a job almost the moment they met.

It was Rip whom chose to set-up shop in the old Gazette building. He mentioned some non-sense about newspapers and living history, or something. It hadn't been important. What was important was what the building now held –the Time-Sphere. The machine that would allow him to send his younger self and the younger Superman back to their own time.

The Commander slipped in through a window left open for that specific purpose. His long cape cascading in behind him, draping over his shoulders and pooling at his feet. It gave the image of a dark fluid shadow drifting in like the ominous specter of death. (Only the Commander did not speak in all capitals or ride a white horse named Binky. It was a shame really, if he did, it might improve his public opinion.)

Rip was bent over a worktable, fiddling with something that was most definitely not a component to the Time-Sphere.

"I told you I wanted a report from you by nine." Growled the Commander.

Rip looked up, a flicker off annoyance flashing over his boyish face before instantly being replaced with jovial smile. "Oh, sorry 'bout that. Time got away form me. But I caught it and brought it right back!"

The Commander grit his teeth and tried not to snarl with irritation. "How is your progress on the Time-Sphere? Is it almost finished?"

"Define 'almost'?"

"Tomorrow!" This time the Commander did snarl. "I need it completed and ready by October twenty-fifth of this year, twenty fifty-six. You might have all the time in the world, Rip Hunter, but I'm working within a deadline!" –literally.

Rip smiled an ironic smile, almost as if he understood the private double entendre that only the Commander could know.

"It'll be ready when you need it." He said cryptically.

The Commander knew it would be; he remembered it was. But he still wanted to hear it. He needed the reassurance. To spite the fact that he already knew what was going to happen, he couldn't just relax and let things play out, and not just because of how they ended. The Commander was the type of person who couldn't leave things to other people as a general rule; it hadn't been so bad when he was younger. But over the years he was forced to learn the hard way that if he didn't do something himself, it might get done, but it wouldn't get done right. It all boiled down to control. If the Commander felt he was in control, then he was safe.

It was a huge effort to begin delegating important tasks to Mar'i and McGinnis. But he knew it had to be done. He wasn't going to be around forever.

To Rip Hunter, he said, "It better be." Then vanished out the same window from which he had entered.

It had been a long time since the Commander last patrolled his city. That was one of the jobs he usually delegated to McGinnis now. But as he left the old Gazette building he was struck by the realization that this just might be the last time he would get to patrol his city. Gotham. His city. Where he was born. Where he was raised.

Gotham had already learned to survive disaster long before the Apokoliptan invasion. A devastating virus known only as the Contagion swept the city early on in the Commander's career as a Robin, then a second outbreak a few years after that that seemed pick-up where the first one left off. But no sooner had the city recovered from the second onslaught of the virus than the state of Jersey was rocked by the cataclysmic 7.6 earthquake with its epicenter not ten miles from the Gotham down town. To add insult to all these injuries, the good ol' U. S. of A decided, in their infinite wisdom, to declare the city a No Man's Land and excommunicated it from American sovereignty. …And all that had even been before the Commander joined the Team as Robin.

The government did eventually come to their senses and Gotham was begrudgingly welcomed back as the proverbial 'prodigal son'. But the people of Gotham learned their lesson. They learned how to survive when times turned desperate and so when Apokolips invaded, when they pierced the earth with their volcanic shafts and the skies darkened and the air filled with ash, the rest of the world panicked. But Gotham just shook her head and said, 'Well, that's new.'

The Commander vaulted to the adjacent roof, then the one next to that, then the one next to that, until he finally came upon buildings tall enough to use his grappling cables on. In the days before the invasion and for some time after, the grapple lines were gas powered and could be propelled higher and farther than a man could swing them. But the gas packs were canisters of super-condensed CO made by Wayne Tech. During the many civil wars that followed the invasion the company collapsed into ruin, their factories destroyed or abandoned, its materials and supply routs cut off, its resources stolen by other factions. Much of what once was, was lost. The Commander, Dick (may he rest in peace), and the Demon (the then Robin) learned to adjust and adapt.

Swigging the grapple line in a circle, faster and faster with each pass, the Commander worked up its speed and momentum before releasing the cable and letting it fly through the air. The grappling hook caught on the bent and twisted remnant of what might have been a rot iron railing for a veranda. It didn't matter what it was, just that it would hold the Commander's weight multiplied by the force of his swing. …Because no one would catch him if he fell.

A few good tugs on the line to test its sturdiness, then the Commander was off. Swinging through the air, over the rooftops of his city. Reveling in the familiar feeling. His version of flying. He flicked his thumb over the small trigger that would release the grappling hook before the line's recoil could snap him back and slam him into the side of a building. Mustn't die before his time, oh no.

The Commander landed roughly, gritting his teeth as leg muscles screamed in protest. He really was getting to old for this.

He looked down the side of the building into the waters of Gotham's Finger River, then up the bank to the power plant they had constructed there. Built right over the water, using the river's current to spin the turbines. Of all the makeshift plants in the city, it was the one the Commander was most proud of. It generated the most power, but only for a single purpose –the Finger River Plant was devoted to the Robinson Park Farmland. It lit the artificial solar lights that made it possible to grow anything in the forsaken world of ever night.

Once again extending his bo-staff, the Commander vaulted his way over the roofs along the river bank to the plant. The whirring-hum of the plants three turbines could be heard from several houses down, a soft whisper that grew in intensity as he drew nearer, like the underscoring rhythm of symphony. The commander could only imagine what it might sound like to someone with Superman's sensitive hearing. Maybe great roar?

He was thinking about him again.

One final vault with his staff, and the Commander was on the roof of the power plant. It spanned the river from bank to bank and was a perfect bridge for people of the roof-hopping persuasion like himself. A light spring and a bit of a jump later he was standing in the old Robinson Park that had been converted into farmland to feed the city.

Late summer corn rose in front of him, tall and green, swaying slightly in the breeze, the rows illuminated by the bright yellow solar lights placed every six feet. The smell of wet earth and corn filled his nostrils and the Commander suddenly felt like he was looking at a different field, at another time, an early evening under an open Kansas sky.

'Isn't it just so awesome? I mean, I grew this!

The Commander forced the memory away. Superman always had been good at growing things, at making things, helping things thrive. He was not so talented. He couldn't make things thrive, he could only help them survive.

"I don't usually see you out and about." Commented a voice behind him. "What brings you out of the Nest?"

The Commander turned. "Hello, Pamela." He said, and nodded to the field. "I was just dropping by to check on your kids."

"Don't be cheeky, Commander." Pamela Isley, former villainess known as 'Poison Ivy', and holder of a Ph. D. in botany smiled a humorless green-lipped smile at him. At the age of seventy-two she was no where near as conventionally attractive as she used to be, but she still possessed the same mine-controlling pheromones that had made her such a formidable villain to begin with. Sometimes, the Commander wondered if that was the real reason he'd placed her in charge of the Robinson Farmland project instead of running her ass out of town like Mar'i suggested he should have.

"I'm never 'cheeky'." He said. Then added, "Harvest is scheduled for next week."

"I know." She nodded stiffly.

"Are we gonna have a problem again?"

The Commander had placed Dr. Isley in charge of the Robinson Farmland because of her knowledge and talent with growing and the results spoke for themselves, no one else managed to produce crops as strong and healthy as she did. But, when it came harvest time, the Commander had to have Nightstar restrain her so that they could actually reap the life-giving sustenance they had grown. Mar'i kept saying Isley was a liability and that they should cut her loose. But the Commander kept her around because she produced the best results and in this world, competence was a near indispensable necessity.

"No." She growled out.

"Good." He nodded. "Enjoy the rest of the season."

He left the park.

It was hours later, after the Commander returned to the Nest and was scribbling down as much as he could remember of the past forty years in a book of 'Spoilers' that Nightstar finally returned.

The Batcave, along with most of Wayne Manor, was destroyed in the invasion and so Dick had moved the bat-clan's base of operations to the remains of the monolithic Wayne Tower. They set up their base in the top three floors, the five floors underneath those were converted into living suits for the family and close friends, beneath that were suits for other allies not so close or not as trusted, then there were several floors untouched, used mostly for storage. The ground floor was converted into MASH camp, originally run by Leslie Thompkin in the early days. Now it was maintained by volunteers.

The name 'Batcave' couldn't apply anymore and for a long time the base had gone without a name. Then someone, the Commander wasn't quite sure who, coined the name 'the Robins Nest', and that stuck. As the years past, the name was shortened to just 'the Nest', and that was what people called it.

Mar'i swaggered in through a roof access door, cloud of black hair wafting behind her.

The Commander turned his chair around and crossed his arms over his chest. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Out." She replied simply. "Since I was already there I thought I'd do a boarder sweep before I came home. Sorry, if you thought I was gone to long. But if you want someone who can fly from Rode Island to Maryland and still make it back by lunchtime, maybe you should finally make-up with Superman."

He ignored the twinge of feeling her comment roused in him. He wouldn't make-up with Superman, the man never listened to anything he said, never gave him an opportunity to explain himself and the Commander wouldn't give him the same curtsey. The difference was, however, Superman didn't need to explain for the Commander to understand, he knew why Superman reacted the way he did. But Superman could never fathom why the Commander did what he did without the help of an explanation –an explanation he never had the opportunity to give. So, no. They would never make-up.

"You're trying to distract me by exploiting an emotional weakness." He said, then feigned an approving nod in an attempt to cover-up just how deeply the mere mention of his former friend affected him. "A good tactic, on most people it works well. But that doesn't change the fact that you went out without a radio while the Comm-Set was down. I don't think I need to tell you how dangerous that is, Mar'i. Your father entrusted your safety to me when he died, don't dishonor his memory by acting so rashly. You are to old for this."

"Please don't talk to me like I'm a child, Uncle." Replied Nightstar, crossing her own arms over her chest. "I am an adult and have been for over a decade. Most women my age have husbands and children by now."

"Most women your age don't have your responsibilities." The Commander reminded her. Then he sighed in resignation, just reminding himself of one more thing he felt guilty over. He stood from his chair and crossed the room, placing his gloved hands on her shoulders. "I'm sorry I've asked so much of you. You and McGinnis both. Goodness knows I've heard him complain more than once about not having enough time to spend with his lover Dina."

"Dana." Mar'i corrected.

"Whatever." The Commander waved dismissively. "The point is, I've asked a lot from you –sometimes, maybe to much- but you and McGinnis have never disappointed me. I'm proud of you. And when I'm gone I want you to be happy."

If her green eyes flashed in sudden alarm, the Commander either did not notice or misinterpreted it. Either way, the expression was there and gone in an instant, covered up by innocent confusion. "Are you going somewhere, Uncle?" Then a coy smile. "What do you know that I don't?"

"Lots of things, Mar'i, lots of things."

.

tick-tock

.

"Nathan!" Bart startled both Tim and Kon with his sudden outburst. He rushed forward and jumped up to drape his arms around a bald man in his mid sixties. "Look at you. Your scar's gone! And you're not wearing a collar anymore!"

"Bart?" The man blinked at the overly energetic speedster. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, that's a long story." He replied flippantly. "But look at you! When I got back and saw the ash-clouds I thought I failed and nothing changed, but if you don't have your powers anymore then I did succeed at something. This is great!"

Nathan patted the speedster on the back with stiff affection, as if he weren't used to such physical intimacy. Then his gaze shifted and he noticed Tim and Kon for the first time. "Who're your friends?"

Tim stepped forward before the Superboy could answer. "Sorry. I'm the Scarlet Pimpernel." He said. "And this is Skywalker. We're new."

"I'm Nathaniel Tryon." He tried for an awkward handshake, made all the more difficult by Bart whom refused to let go of the man. "Skywalker, huh?" He looked Kon up and down, taking in the bright orange jumpsuit, the plastic toy lightsaber hung as his belt, the white helmet with rose-tinted visor and red Rebel alliance insignia. "You seem a bit young to be a Star Wars fan."

"I, uh… My big brother got me into it." Replied the Superboy hesitantly, as if he didn't quite know what he was supposed to say. It was a true enough statement, but from what he'd seen of this future so far, he would hazard a guess that DVDs were a thing of legend and no one had seen a movie in a very long time.

"So, how'd you meet our little Bart?" Asked Nathan as if he already guessed the answer.

There was a beat of silence.

Then, "Allen!? What the hell are you doing back here!?"

They all turned at the man's voice.

He was slender, but well muscled. Approximately mid-thirties. Dark hair. Dressed head to toe in white with a black domino mask covering his eyes. A utility belt like one of the ones the bat-clan wore was around his waist and he carried a sword. A Japanese style katana.

Now, Bart did let go of Nathan and took a slight step in front of Tim and Kon, a poor attempt at subtly placing himself between his friends and the newcomer. "Oh… hi, Demon."

The whited-out slits of the Demon's domino mask narrowed at the speedster before his gaze shifted to the two behind him. "I don't know you."

"I'm Skywalker, and this is the Scarlet Pimpernel." Kon was quick to answer, a friendly smile on his face.

This did nothing to alleviate the Demon's suspicious demeanor. He placed one hand on the hilt of his sword as if in readiment to draw. "The Scarlet Pimpernel… I used to know someone who liked that book. And I didn't know anyone under the age of thirty knew what Star Wars was anymore… And you arrived with Allen…"

"Listen, Demon, I just think you should know-" The speedster was cut off mid-sentence by the swing of a blade, the flash of silvered steel in the dim light and the crack of stressed plastic.

Superboy's plastic X-wing helmet fell away in two pieces that clattered to the floor. He blinked at the sword blade resting on his forehead in shock. No one had even seen the swing, just a flash of steel.

"Superman!" Red Arrow and Icicle breathed in mirrored shock.

"What? I'm not Superman."

"No." The Demon agreed. "If you came with Allen then you're from forty years in the past." He withdrew the sword from Kon's face, but made no move to re-sheath it. "I have no quarrel with you, clone. But if you're the Superboy…" the blade drifted over to Tim "…then you must be Drake!"

Tim was saved from the sword strike by Bart grabbing him by the mid-section and jerking him out of the way.

"Oh, this is just to perfect! Now I can kill you before you have the chance to usurp what's rightfully mine!"

Tim was back on his feet in a moment, bo-staff extended, ready for defense. "I have no idea what you're talking about!"

Kon was by his side a second later and the Boy Wonder felt his TTK field envelop them both. "What's going on? We haven't done anything to you!"

"No." The Demon agreed. "Drake hasn't done anything yet. But he will."

By his side, the Boy Wonder tugged on the Superboy's bright orange sleeve. "Kon, we're in an enemy camp, surrounded by hostile agents. We don't know all their powers and we don't know what's going on. Lets get out of here."

"But-" The demi-kryptonian protested.

"Run! Now!" The Robin insisted. "Just do what I say and we'll get through this!"

So, the Superboy lifted the Boy Wonder into his arms and sped off through the train station, over the tent-city on the platform and down the tunnel. Back out the way they came. But the moment they were back out in the ash-choked air, they froze.

Just a ways away from them, clad in a solid blue unitard, red boots, red belt and red cape wafting in the wind, the S-shield in red and black on his chest was… another Kon.

"Hi." Said the tights wearing doppleganger. "I don't want to sound cliché when I say this, but Demon's got kryptonite down there so… Come with me if you want to live!"

.

tick-tock

.


	4. Put Your Hands on Your Hips

Bart was thrown hard against the chipped and discolored tile of the station wall.

"Alright, Allen, talk!" Commanded the Demon. "And if you even consider running… Harper! Mahkent! Grab Neutron."

With slight confusion coloring their faces, each woman took one of Nathan's arms.

"What are we doing with him exactly…?" Asked Isabella, her ice-blue eyes blinking at the Demon's white-clad back.

"If Allen tries to run, hurt him." Replied the Demon as if this should have been obvious, not even bothering to turn around. One must never take chances with a speedster, they were to damn fast. "Now, talk! How much do they know? What did you tell them? What did they see?"

"What does it matter?" Asked Red Arrow. "Superman and the Commander aren't friends. Its not like he's gonna go out of his way to warn the guy."

This time, the Demon did turn around to glare at the Ruby Archer. "Don't you get it?" He asked in a voice full of quiet danger. "They came here with Allen, they came from forty years in the past. For all I know, the Usurper could have known my plans all along. Drake is a smart bastard! It wouldn't take many clues for him to put together an accurate idea of my plans. All he'd need were my intensions and the nature of our relation."

.

tick-tock

.

At first it looked like a misshapen and disorganized mass of vaguely interlocking blue crystals jutting up from a gray and barren landscape. But as they drew nearer it became clear that the tilted and angled towers weren't random, they were part of a single structure, like off-shoots from tree. Surplus crystals growing up around a single colossal dome. Bart did say that 'Superman' built a new Fortress in Smallville, the Fortress of Paradise.

Descending slowly, details became clearer. Ash collected on sides of crystals, or clumped together and tumbled down the sides in bunches. The landscape around the base of the dome looked odd. Like someone had unevenly stacked darkly colored legos all around it. A tad belatedly, they realized they were structures, buildings and houses; all paneled in what looked like tank armor and high intensity shielding.

'Superman', or future-Kon (in tights!), landed just outside what looked like a blast-door, like the kind they used to have on Watchtower. From his bright red boot, the future-Kon pulled a small flat crystal on a keychain and inserted it into in a slot beside the blast-door. Two layers of panels slid aside to reveal a grungy and well-worn air-lock. Or, what looked like an air-lock.

"Seriously?" The time-displaced Superboy blinked. A whole new Fortress all to himself and he decided to make something as terrestrial and mundane as a front door and key. He could fly for cripes sake! "No roof access?"

His future counterpart just looked at him. It was the single most eerie feeling, receiving that look from his own face. "Nothing can penetrate the dome."

…And there was a silent warning under that. Not that nothing could penetrate the dome, but that he couldn't let anything penetrate the dome. That crystal structure they saw from the air, those white and blue spires all jutting up at odd angles weren't random off-shoots, or side effects of the kryptonian construction. They were a cross-hatching defense, to protect the outside of the dome. Superman-Kon gave Superboy-Kon a light shove on the back and he and Robin stepped through the blast-doors and into the Fortress of Paradise's entrance way, the panels slamming shut behind them with an ominous sheeing-CLANG.

The chamber was only slightly less dim than the world outside, lit by flickering florescent lights. They were blasted with jets of cool air, the ash and dirt and whatever else from the outside that clung to their bodies and clothing scoured from them and collected on the already dirty floor.

"What the-!" The usually calm and collected Tim jumped in surprise. Of all the possibilities he'd been running through in his mind for what to expect from a Fortress run by Kon, a decontamination chamber immediately upon entering had not been one of them.

"We can't afford any foreign microbes or bacteria getting into the Fortress." Superman explained. When the air jets were done, he inserted his crystal key in another slit in the wall and a side-panel slid away. "If a virus infected the herd or bacteria contaminated the crops… life's a precarious things these days. Its not like how it used to be."

"Clearly." Tim commented dryly.

Superman offered no comment. He led the Robin and his younger self out of the decontamination chamber and into what looked like a customs office in an airport –except without all the foot traffic. A woman sat at a booth, her legs thrown up onto the table, a very old and very beaten book in her hands. Its cover sported more duct-tape than actual cover, but it looked suspiciously like one of the later Harry Potter books and Tim reeled for a moment at seeing something so familiar from his own time here in this end-of-the-world future.

She marked her place with a dried cornhusk painted with an amateurish sun and moon motif, before looking up at them. "Welcome back, Superman." She smiled. Then added, "…and, other Superman?"

She looked from Kon to future-Kon and back again in stark confusion.

Superman ignored her questioning glance and pushed both boys forward, saying, "They're just visiting and need ration cards for tonight and tomorrow morning."

"Right." She lowered her feet from the counter and stowed her book, suddenly all business. "I'll need to know your height, weight, and age."

"Uh… what?" For the second time since entering the Fortress of Paradise, Tim was thrown. This didn't usually happen to him and he did not like this feeling of not knowing exactly what was going on.

"So that I know how many calories you need to take in daily." The woman explained. "So that I can draft an accurate ration card for you. No one eats without a ration card. Resources are limited and we've got to make sure everyone is provided for."

Tim supposed that made sense. Food would be hard to come by in this bleak, dark, ash-choked landscape. What foodstuffs that there were would be rare and precious. Most people would try and hoard them. But Kon, much like Clark in classic Boy Scout fashion, would try and share and make sure everyone got a little bit. It was just surprising to see such a level of structure and organization in a place run by Kon of all people!

On the other hand, this whole distribution of resources thing did feel eerily like a form of Socialism and Tim found it equally surprising that such a thing was being practiced on Superman's home soil. Superman was supposed to be the All American Hero. Smallville was supposed to be the classic 'small town America'. Now look at them. Oh! The irony! Tim almost wanted to take a picture, except no picture could convey the incongruitous humor he found in this. Instead he promised himself he'd tease Kon about it when they got back to their own time.

Tim didn't feel comfortable giving personal details like height and age to strangers. Things like that could ultimately lead one to discovering his identity. But they were forty years removed from everyone they knew and who knew them. Kon had a counterpart walking around, heck!, Tim probably did too. There was no reason to think anyone would connect him with the Robin, or Nightwing, or whatever alias he was using today (or if he was even using a handle) from this time. So, he told her he was fourteen-years-old, five foot two, and a hundred and forty-two pounds (it was all muscle, well, okay, maybe a little baby-fat still).

The woman took her time doing some calculations –long hand on a piece of paper with a pencil- then with a bold black pen filled out a small card for him. It was about the size of a standard punch card, the kind you get at video stores or coffee shops. Ten lattes and the eleventh one's free! She marked him down for two meals (a dinner and a breakfast) and then a miscellaneous snack (because he was still a growing boy). Each one was initialed in a different colored pen before the card was finally handed to him (to discourage forgeries, he assumed).

Kon's ration card didn't take nearly as long Superman-Kon just told the woman to use his own ration figures. She didn't even have to calculate anything, just jotted it down as if it were something she did all the time.

Then they were off, being lead down a corridor, around a corner, through a hallway, more turns, more passageways. When they met people, Superman-Kon would give a polite nod of his head and offer a greeting, maybe inquire about children, grandparents, siblings, or lovers. They responded with the same kind of polite familiarity, asked about the curious strangers he was with, everyone was particularly confused by the Superboy. Superman deflected their polite inquiries with a subtlety Tim did not know Kon possessed. Then he remembered that the Superboy was half-Luthor, perhaps this was a latent talent that manifested at some point within the past forty years?

One thing that struck Tim as strange, well… one of many things, but he didn't have the time ponder them all. One of the things that Tim found strange was that everyone seemed so relived when they saw Superman in the corridors. Almost as if they were mentally preparing themselves for the worst, but the moment they glimpsed future-Kon striding through the halls in his blue suit and red cape, the S-shield bold on his chest in black and red, they were reassured.

Even after the end of the world, the sight of Superman was a thing of hope. Bruce had once compared Clark to a god, looking at the way Kon's mere presence seemed to reassure and inspire people… it was remarkably easy to see how 'Superman' could be viewed as a messiah.

Finally, they turned one final corner. A door slid open for them. Superman took one step out into sunlight!

Bright, beautiful, golden sunlight!

Tim and Kon stepped out of the dimly lit and grungy corridor of the city and onto the Kent family farm. Rolling fields. Grazing cattle. Blue, open sky. Sky!

"Welcome to the Fortress of Paradise." Said Superman.

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tick-tock

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The Comm-Set was still down everywhere outside the city, but within the Gotham Territory seat it was perfectly functional. Terry McGinnis was illustrating this fact by placing a call to his very patient and understanding girlfriend.

"No, I'm not trying to avoid you, Dana!" He pleaded into the transmitter. "I really have been busy. Working in the Nest is demanding and the Commander's been making us pull double shifts all day today. Didn't you notice Batman did two patrols earlier? I know… I know… this has been happening a lot. Well, I'm sorry, but there's nothing I can do about that! Don't say that! Dana, you know I-"

He was cut off mid-thought when the teleprism on the consol beside the Comm-Set array suddenly faired to life. Terry would never understand how kryptonian crystal-tech worked. The Commander said the thing was powered by stored solar energy and could run for years. It relayed both audio and visual signals through a complicated particle wave that traveled at near light speed so that communication was instantaneous with absolutely no lag. The Commander had gone on to explain why that was, but it was long and boring and had big words. Long story short, kryptonian crystal-tech was shway and Terry wished they had more of it.

But he couldn't answer a call from the Fortress of Paradise with Dana on the Comm-Set. Terry McGinnis, volunteer, working in the Nest, doing chores for the bat-clan did not answer calls from Superman. But Batman did.

"Dana, I gotta call you back." He muttered into the Comm, knowing he'd pay for it later. Everything would just be so much easier if the Commander didn't have that stupid gag-order on his identity. He hung-up before his already irate girlfriend could reply. Pulling his full-face mask and cowl on with one hand, he flicked a finger over the mineral cluster that answered in-coming signals. Superman's face appeared in the central crystal, as if refracted from the inside. Dark-haired, blue-eyed, and looking as young as Terry was, though he knew the man was actually in his mid-forties.

"Oh, good, its you." He said.

"Superman." Batman acknowledged with a slight nod. "Would you like me to get the Commander?"

"No!" Superman snapped with a bit more vehemence than was merited. Then, in a much more controlled tone, repeated, "No. Just… just tell him, 'I have them in my custody. I'll bring them to Gotham tomorrow'. He'll know who I'm talking about."

"I'll relay the message." The Batman assured him. The Superman said nothing to thank or even acknowledge the young Bat's assurances. He simply ended the transmission. The teleprism flickered for a moment then went dark, looking like nothing more than an over sized paper-weight. Terry pushed his mask back from his face and heaved a sigh. He'd hung up on Dana for that! With an apprehensive groan, the switched the Comm-Set back on and dialed Dana, fully prepared to grovel.

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tick-tock

.

Superboy sat at the familiar kitchen table, in the familiar farmhouse kitchen, sipping watery tea from a familiar china mug. The table was older, more warn, its finish scratched and blemished and chipped. The kitchen likewise showed more wear and tear than Kon remembered. The floor scuffed, and in places completely replaced by crystal paneling. The counter was chipped and in places whole tiles were missing. The window drapes were faded and discolored. Even the mug he held was chipped, its bottom permanently stained with a dark ring, the design on the outside scrubbed almost completely away by forty years of washing.

Robin had slipped into 'inspect everything' mode and Kon could hear him upstairs, carefully opening every closet, cupboard, cabinet and drawer, and –very carefully- rummaging through it's contents before putting everything back exactly as he'd found it. Tim was quite adept at that, searching a room thoroughly and completely without leaving the slightest trace that he'd been there. 'Ninja training' Wally called it. Be he was mostly talking about Nightwing. With Tim it was more than just ninja training, the little Robin had an attention to detail that was almost compulsively obsessive.

Kon's future counterpart, whom everyone called 'Superman' had dropped them off at the Kent farmhouse before jetting off to some other part of the Fortress of Paradise. He told the little Robin that he could search and inspect every part of the house if he wanted to, he wouldn't find anything interesting. He said it with such an angry vehemence too; it left Kon wondering what in the world Tim –or maybe Tim's future counterpart- could have done to piss him off so much. Kon, that is 2016-Kon, knew perfectly well that so long as Timothy Drake was awake and ambulatory he would try to learn everything he possibly could about his surroundings, his situation and the people that figured into it. It was just one of those things that made Tim, Tim.

The afore mentioned Mr. Drake came tromping down the stairs in exasperation a few minuets later, looking disappointed. "Future-you lives like a freaking monk!" He said. "I couldn't even find any of your motorcycle-porn."

"Its not 'porn'. They're just magazines." Kon informed him for what was probably the eighth time since September.

Tim just gave him his 'I don't believe you, but I'm humoring you anyway' look, but said nothing. He pulled out the chair opposite the Superboy and flopped down. "I did find the action figure I gave you for your liberation day a few months back. It was all smashed up in a box with pieces from other figures."

"Aw, I'm sorry, man." Kon stood to fetch a second mug from the cupboard and pore a cup of tea for Tim. "Maybe it got broke in one of the fights with bad guys I'm sure we'll have between now and… now?"

"Now and then, maybe." Tim suggested. "Anyway, it was just interesting to see that you still kept it all these years. Seeing as how it was a gag-gift to begin with."

Kon shrugged. "Who knows. Maybe future-you still has that monster capture game I got you."

"Maybe…" Tim agreed. "But we can't focus on something so mundane as that right now. We still need to figure out how to get back to our own time, and now we're separated from Bart. I'm still not sure what's going one exactly. Who that 'Demon' was, why he wants to kill me, and what I'm gonna do to him between now and then that could make him hate me so much."

"Do bad guys need reasons to hate the good guys?"

Tim sipped the watery tea slowly. "I don't think he was a 'bad guy', though. Not really… Bart was a member of his 'League of New Shadows', and while we haven't really known him very long, I can't really see him staying with, or even teaming up with a group that had evil intentions. Plus, look at the world they live in, Kon. I don't think anyone can really afford to be 'evil' here. Self-serving, yes. Evil? I'm not so sure."

"Tim, he tried to kill you." Kon stated flatly. "Bad guys kill, good guys don't. Its as simple as that."

"We could launch into a long philosophical debate about that." The Boy Wonder informed him. "Just so you know."

"No." Kon shook his head. "because there's nothing to debate. Murder, bad. Life, good."

"Ah, but there's the crux of it." Tim leaned back in his seat, making the old wood creak, and steepled his fingers. "The word 'murder' is a legal term that refers to any unlawful or unsanctioned killing. It doesn't mean any death by the hands of another person as opposed to natural causes. I'm sure each territory and nomadic group would have their own system of laws and each might define an 'unlawful killing' differently."

Kon just glared at him from across the table. "I hate it when you do that."

"Do what?"

"Play devil's advocate. You go all scary-Tim and I don't like it."

If the Boy Wonder was going to say anything in reply, he didn't get the chance to. They were both distracted from the conversation, their attention drawn instead to a knock at the door. Future-Kon, or 'Superman', wouldn't knock before entering his own home, so it was a safe bet that it wasn't him. The two exchanged a look.

"Should we answer it?" Asked Kon.

"This is your future-house, why are you asking me?"

"Well then," Kon stood, "it would be rude to leave them standing out on the porch. Ma certainly wouldn't approve."

He crossed the living room to the entrance way and pulled open the door. …And was suddenly and instantly struck by the bizarre notion that he was looking at the amalgamation of Peter Ross and Lana Lang-Ross. The man standing on the porch had Peter's square jaw and blue eyes, but Lana's high cheekbones, strait nose and the devil's red hair. The knees of his well-worn pants sported fresh mud-stains and his fingernails were dirt-blackened. He glared down at the Superboy from a little less than a foot height difference, arms crossed over his chest, everything about his posture screaming irritation.

"Yes?" Asked Kon, at a complete and total loss as to what to do or say. "May I help you?"

"I'm very annoyed with you." He said. "I just want you to know that. People talk, Superman, and when you go rushin' off –in uniform- without the slightest explanation besides 'there's somewhere I have to be' people start talking about another invasion. Do you know what that leads to? Panic! That's what that leads to. I'm an engineer! I don't do crown control. Now, I don't mind covering for you and doin' a harvest every now and then, I'm a farmer's son and its in my blood. But I can't do my job with a fleet of workers who're scared shitless that the sky's gonna start falling again. You understand me?"

"Uh…" Maybe Kon shouldn't have answered the door and just waited for his future counterpart to get back. "Sorry. Who are you?"

The man's irritation melted out of him almost instantly. "Damn it, you got into red kryptonite again didn't you?" He placed the palm of his hand to Kon's forehead, then moved to feel under his chin and neck. "Well, it doesn't look like it affected you physically this time. I guess I'll just have to put up with some slight amnesia for the next forty-eight hours. You didn't happen to save the chunk, did you? So that I can put it in the vault with the others."

"Uh…" Okay, whoever this was, they were pretty well informed on kryptonians and how kryptonite affected them. Red kryptonite was like a roulette wheel. Each fragment caused a different effect which ranged anywhere from altering behavior to transforming Clark into a giant mother-fucking-dragon! Luckily, the effects only lasted between thirty-six to forty-eight hours, after which the red-K fragment was no longer effective against the kryptonian –ever. (Clark liked to keep the ones he had encountered in a vault in the Fortress of Solitude. Kon got into it one time, oh!, it was not pretty.)

Luckily, the time-displaced Supeboy was saved from continuing this awkward conversation by the appearance of his future –or would he be 'present-day'- counterpart. "CP, you've got the wrong Super."

The man –CP- looked between the two Kons. Then his shoulders slouched and he heaved an exasperated sight. "Oh, man… this is gonna be some freaky parallel dimensions mishap, isn't it?"

"No. But close." Superman strode past CP and placed a strong hand on Kon's shoulder –squeezing a bit harder than was necessary- and steered the Superboy back into the house. To CP, he called over his shoulder, "Do you have the numbers from the harvest for me?"

"Yeah. That's the real reason I came here." He followed the Supers into the house, closing the door behind him.

"Good." Superman commented dryly, forcefully shoving the Superboy back into his seat at the table. "Making unscheduled visits just to criticize my conduct isn't in your standard repertoire. And I'd be very annoyed if you started, goodness knows I got more than enough of that from Red Robin back in the day."

Tim raised his head slightly at the unfamiliar handle, wondering if something happened to him within the past forty years, or if Bruce had gone in for a fourth Robin, or possibly both. But Superman was not looking at him, so the young Boy Wonder did not ask. Instead his eyes flicked to Kon, his Kon –the Superboy- with a silent question. But there was no recognition on the demi-kryptonian's face. He was just as confused as Tim.

Clark-Peter's eyes flicked over the young Robin for a moment before asking, "And they are…"

"Visiting." Supplied the Superman shortly in a tone that made it clear no further elaboration would be given. "Just put the harvest inventory and reports on the table and I'll get to it when I have time. For the moment, can you take that one-" he pointed to Tim "-out for a bit. Nowhere specific, I just need a moment to talk to myself without him hovering. And, for the love of pie!, don't let him near any terminals."

"Uh, sure." Clark-Peter reached a hand into the pocket of his old and faded jeans and pulled out a round crystal sphere. This, he set on the table exactly as Superman asked. "Here the harvest numbers. C'mon, kid, lets give them their space."

Kon looked like he was about to protest. Sure, it was his future counterpart that had suggested it and they were in his own future-Fortress, but the Superboy did not like the idea of the two of them being separated in this bleak end-of-the-world future. He knew that if he was going to have any hope of getting back to 2016, he would need Tim's smartyness (not to mention he didn't want anything unpleasant to happen to his friend if he could have been there to have prevented it). But, at the same time, this was his future counterpart. Emphasis on the 'future'. Superman-Kon had already gone through all this and knew nothing terrible would happen between now and when Tim returned at the end of whatever conversation he wanted to have with his younger self. Kon was torn by conflicting instincts and he did not like the feeling.

Tim must have guessed his thoughts, because he shot the demi-kryptonian a reassuring look. Followed promptly by a flick of the eyes, a silent command to stay seated.

The young Boy Wonder didn't care much for being dismissed like unwanted and excess baggage. But he figured future-Kon was planning on doing something that might risk messing-up the time-stream –something both versions on him would assume Tim would disapprove of. They were right, he would disapprove, but only because he knew it would be a waste of time and effort. It would just create a paradox (as he already explained). Either that, or a self-fulfilling prophecy. Then again, maybe that was the plan. Maybe future-Kon was going to explain to 2016-Kon exactly how he had constructed this 'Fortress of Paradise' so that we would know how to make it when it was needed. Goodness knew, Conner Kon-El Kent, the Superboy, didn't have the patience necessary to actually study how to make it on his own.

These were Tim's thoughts as he followed the red-haired man out.

"I'm Clark-Peter, by the way." He said when they were standing on the porch. "But everyone just calls me CP for short. And you're who, the Crimson Kid?"

Tim just stared at him for a moment. "Clark-Peter? As in Peter Ross and Lana Lang-Ross' son?"

"Yes. So, then my parents were big names in your dimension."

Tim paused for a moment. He set aside his surprise at realizing that he was now being 'baby-sat' by the very same infant Kon often had to baby-sit for in their own time. It really shouldn't be all that unexpected. Who else would future-Kon trust as his right hand in this post-apocalyptic future? Instead, the Boy Wonder focused on Clark-Peter's assumption that he and his Kon were from another dimension rather than another time. If that was what CP believed, then he shouldn't have any reservations about chatting with Tim –beyond the normal reservations of a man who knew more about Capes and Masks than was common. Maybe, talking to Clark-Peter, he could get a better idea of what might have happened in the past forty years to make that 'Demon' person want to kill him.

"Uh, no, not really." Tim replied. "But they're friends of my friends. Kon –my Kon- baby-sits for you when you're parents are out."

"Huh, ain't that funny. Superman used to baby-sit for me too. 'Course, he wasn't 'Superman' back then."

"No." Tim agreed. Then, just because he was curious and liked to gather information, not because he had any misplaced ideas of changing events that had already happened, he asked, "How'd you find out Kon was Super…" Should he finish that with '-boy' or '-man'? "…person. How'd you find out Kon was a Super-person?"

"Through the usual way." He shrugged. "By accident. It was during the invasion, ya see. I was just a kid at the time, not even in my teens yet. The skies were still clear then, no ash, I mean. I remember we were crouching in a dike, Pa had his back to the levy reloading his shotgun while Ma took shots off her rifle. She had good aim, too. Head-shots every one of 'em, but they didn't do much. They kept telling me to keep my head down and stay hidden."

Clark-Peter sat down in one of the wicker chairs on the porch. They were older now, the paint all but gone, and there were no cushions to speak of. But Tim was pretty sure these were the same damn wicker patio chairs Clark had at the house back in 2016. He sat in the one opposite CP. The small table between them was new –well, new-ish. A segment cut from an old tree of one variety or another. Probably almost as old at the ash-clouds were since Tim hadn't seen any trees since arriving here in 2056 –not even here in Paradise. Poor future-Kon with no apples to make pie.

"I'm sure my parents thought we were gonna die." Continued Clark-Peter. "They didn't say it, but I could hear it in the way Pa kept chanting 'its gonna be okay' and the tightness in Ma's eyes. Then I see somethin' above us, not a Parademon or a hovertank. A flash of blue and red, and I shout 'look up in the sky'. And sure enough, there's Superboy ploughing through the swarm, knocking Parademons into other Parademons and such. And Red Robin's there too, like a shadow hopping from monster to monster, sometimes using some as living gliders, sometimes snagging one with his ropes and using it to swing from. It was amazing, seeing the two of them in action together. Power and Precision, working together. Just the two of them managed enough damage that the Parademon's retreated and when it was over, Superboy came down to check on us. Called my parents by their names; and Ma, she called him 'Conner'. That's when I knew."

To all of that, all Tim could say way, "Sorry, did you say Superboy was wearing blue and red?"

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tick-tock

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The moment the door shut behind Tim and Clark-Peter, Superman whipped his younger counterpart's chair around to face him. Placing both hands on the boy's shoulders he stared him directly in the, crystal-blue meeting crystal-blue, and said in all seriousness, "You should end your friendship with Tim Drake."

There was a beat of silence in which the younger man only stared at him in dumbfounded disbelief.

Superman remembered this moment from forty years ago. Remembered being confused, remembered not believing his older self, and completely disregarding the warnings he gave. Superman knew it was a wasted effort and that nothing would change. But still… he had to try. Because he also remembered forty years ago, when Bart first saw his friend Nathaniel Tyron for the first time after returning to his own time, the speedster had commented on how he had changed. A scar and a collar. They were small changes and didn't affect the overall flow of the time-stream –like throwing a pebble in a river. But little pebbles built up. So, the Superman tried in the hopes of the off chance that something might change.

"What!?" The young Superboy blinked.

"Tim, Robin –when the Commander sends you both back to your own time, you should end your friendship." Superman repeated, exactly as he remembered himself saying forty years earlier. "Sooner is better than later. But you two can't afford to be tense and angry with each other until you're back safe in 2016. So you should wait until then."

"But… why!?"

"Because," and here he lowered his voice to a tone of grave seriousness that made his younger counterpart shiver with foreboding. "At some point between your present and my present, he is going to betray you, and that betrayal will change you both."

The young Superboy raised a quizzical eyebrow at his older counterpart. Superman remembered the thoughts that went through his head at that admission. Really? He was worried about a ruined friendship when the rest of the world around him had darkened and ash rained down from the sky. But then, he remembered how he felt after Kaldur's betrayal... and M'gann's. Whether by the hands of friends or lovers, betrayal cut deep and the stronger the bond between the parties, the more reprehensible act to break it, and the harder the blow to the heart when it did break. Hard enough to leave permanent scars. Hard enough to change them both. "What happened?" He asked. "Or, what will happen?"

Superman straitened. Removing his hands from his younger counterpart's shoulders, not trusting himself to touch the dopplegangar as the memories rose to the forefront of his mind. He took a step back. It would be almost twenty years ago by now… from his side of the time-stream. He still remembered the pungent smell of synthetic embryonic fluid cut by the sharp scent of antiseptic. 'What the fuck, Tim! What the hell is this!?' His knee on a broad chest bearing the pentagonal shield of El, but in place of the trademark S was a robin's head in profile, a stylized version of Tim's new 'Red Robin' symbol. TTK holding the body down as it struggled against his hold. The pop and snap of ribs as they cracked under the weight of his knee and telekinetic power. His hands around an unblemished alabaster throat…

'Kon, stop! You don't understand!'

Superman took a long, deep breath to calm his nerves. Held it in until the count of ten, then exhaled slowly. He did not look at the Superboy when he said, "One of these days, you're going to die."

"What?" Asked the boy, disbelieving. "That can't be right. If I'm dead, then how are you standing right here? Unless…" He trailed off, thinking. "Unless, you're not really me. Unless, you're… another clone?"

"I am you!" Snarled the Superman. "I did die. I was dead. But… but I got better. That's not my point. In that time that I was dead, Tim… failed to cope. He…" now it was the Superman's turn to trail off. "Tell me, at this point in your life, what is your opinion on cloning?"

"On cloning?" The younger Kon blinked. "Well, I am a clone, so I'm kinda obligated not to hate it, but… I really wish Lex would stop cloning Clark."

"And what if someone tried to clone you instead of Clark?"

The Superboy's face darkened. His mouth forming into one solid down-turned line of a frown. "That I don't think I would approve of. I never asked to be created and I wouldn't want another to go through what I've been through being a clone."

"These are opinions you would share with your best friend, yes?"

"Of course!" Kon nodded. "Tim knows how I feel."

"Now, what if I told you that over the next twenty or so years, those opinions only get stronger." Superman crossed his arms over his chest, still not looking at the Superboy. "Issues with Match, Red Arrow always at odds with Arsenal, the Lois-clone, Composite… Every time you meet a clone, you start to dislike them more and more, to the point where its almost like a hate; and sometimes you might even hate yourself simply for being what you are. And Tim… knows this, knows all of this. He's your best friend and your confidant, you tell him everything. Then you die. But rather than mourning your death like everyone else, he just replaces you. With a clone of you that he made himself."

'What the fuck, Tim! What the hell is this!?'

'Kon, stop! You don't understand!'

Superman shut his eyes against the memories that clawed up unbidden. "He's going to betray you." He said. "Tim's going to betray you, and when he does it will break everything inside you. That strong moral core you're so confident in right now, all that quaint goodness nurtured here in Smallville… it all just shatters and you break your rule. That one rule that you swore you'd never break. You finally become the weapon you were created to be."

"No." The Superboy bolted to his feet, a growl low in the back in his throat. A deep feral sound. "That will never happen. Nothing Tim… nothing anyone could ever do would push me that far. It just won't happen! You're lying! Making this up to test me, or teach me some sort of a lesson."

Now the Superman finally looked back at his doppelganger, meeting the younger man's crystal eyes that mirrored his own. He remembered the feel of unblemished alabaster skin under his hands, the impotent gasps for air, the snap and pop of ribs beneath his knee, the pull against his tactile telekinesis as the clone struggled against his hold. "I wish I were. But a lot will happen between now and then. A lot to change your views. But Tim… Tim's betrayal was the final straw. Tim was what broke me. So I broke his little doll, and I destroyed its body so there would be no resurrection."

At his sides, Kon's hands balled themselves into fists so tight his nails dug into the skin of his palms. "You… you're a monster! I'll never become you!"

"And you won't." Superman assured him. "So long as you end your friendship with Tim as soon as you return to your own time. If you end it now, you'll both have ample time to move on. Your death won't affect him as much. He won't clone you. You won't have to break your rule when you return. But if you stay friends with him, if you continue with your adventures and misadventures and become the 'Junior Finest' –as the papers will dub you- then, yes, you will become me."

A silence settled over them as the Superboy considered the weight and gravity of his words. His proclamations of doom and then Tim's earlier warnings and explanations of how one couldn't alter time. Event that have already happened have already happened. To change them would erase your original reason for wanting to change them so you would have no motivation to change them, so nothing would change. A Barjavel Paradox, Tim called it.

"But… wait…" Kon began slowly, remembering something else. "When we got to the League of New Shadows and met Nathaniel Tyron, Bart said he had a scar that disappeared, and a collar –an inhibitor collar, I assume. If Bart managed to change that, then that means that some things can be changed!"

At this, Superman smirked. "Now you understand."

"But I'll do it without sacrificing my friendship with Tim." Added the Superboy. "If I can change our fate, I will. But I won't cast him off just because he might betray me. I know it's coming, so now I can look out for it. I won't make the same mistake you make."

Superman sighed and shook his head. He knew even before he began that it was a waste of breath and effort. Nothing has changed. This little exchange went exactly as he remembered it. "Then you've already doomed yourself."

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	5. Tuck Your Knees in Tight

Tents came down. Sleeping bags were rolled up. Bags and weapons were thrown over shoulders. Everywhere, bodies scrambled to break camp. The League of New Shadows was moving. The Demon said 'jump'; everyone answered 'how high'.

He had to proceed now under the assumption that the Usurper knew his plans and had known his plans all along, ever since before his mother had dropped him off on his father's doorstep. Before he even knew who the demon was, before they had ever even met, the Usurper knew they would be enemies. So much was thrown into perspective now…

Yes, the Demon had been the aggressor at the start of their relationship. New to his father's household, already at the age ten and unsure of his position, the Demon had taken it into his head to kill the Usurper, Tim Drake. Years later he realized it had been a ridiculous notion and he and Drake made nice. Of course, that was mostly due to the fact that they needed to work together to repel a hostile alien invasion and protect the Earth. But they still managed to work in tandem without incident and the Demon was forced to admit the value of Drake's existence.

Then Grayson passed away.

That was when everything changed. Grayson had taken over as Batman and as patriarch of the bat-clan after the Demon's father disappeared. When it became apparent that the original Batman was never coming back, Grayson's claim to the Batman mantle was solidified. Grayson became like a second father figure to the Demon –though, he was sure to make it clear and distinct that he did not view Mar'i Grayson as a sister. But after Grayson passed away, a question arose as to who would take over the Batman mantle. The Demon claimed it by birthright; Drake claimed it by right of seniority.

They fought.

At first just with words. For days they argued, throwing arguments and evidence as to why each of them was more qualified to be the next Batman. They became as mature and civil as two children fighting over a ball on the play yard. Both wore their own variations of the Batman uniform, both answered to the name. Then, one evening in the Nest their 'debate' escalated into blows. Damian won that first match and Drake slunk away, beaten, his tail between his legs.

'Go cry to your boyfriend!' The Demon shouted after him, knowing that it would hurt Drake far more than any physical would he'd sustained. To be reminded of the dear friend he'd lost, then regained, only to –by his own hands- drive him away again. The Demon was still unclear on the details; he never did find out what Drake did that had made the clone hate him so much. All he cared about in that moment was that it would add insult to the injuries Drake already had. He thought it would hobble his spirit and break whatever resolve he might have had left –to be reminded that he was truly and totally alone in the world. No one loved him. Even his best friend hated him.

Oh, how wrong the Demon was.

Drake did not break. Drake seethed. The Demon underestimated him. He returned less than a year later, no longer calling himself 'Batman', or 'Red Robin' or even just 'Robin'. In solid black body armor and a black cape and cowl, much like his father's but without the iconic bat symbol on the chest. Drake snuck into Nest, hacked the computers –he had always been better at that sort of thing than the Demon. All the Robins were better at computers then the Demon, his talents lay in the more physical arts of the job.

Drake fed false information from the Nest's own computers to a select few influential civilians in the city. Nothing large or earth-shattering. Just things to make them wonder, and think, and guide their trains of thought to Drake's station. It took a week, but within a week the whole city was in Drake's pocket. Psychological warfare, and Drake had won it. Popular opinion was an amazing and underappreciated weapon. Drake commanded Gotham then, he was the Commander. And Gotham turned on her Batman, the Demon was forced to flee the city.

Mar'i offered to come with him; to share his exile and that single offer warmed him. Probably saved him from becoming another monster worse than Drake. It definitely moved him enough to throw caution and sanity to the wind and declare his undying love for her. Out there, on the ash-choked wasted of the border between the city and the habitable zone… The clouds dark and bleak above, somber gray 'snow' falling around them, standing on the cracked and broken remains of what might have been a low-income housing district. The Demon spoke the one three-word sentence he never planned to utter in his whole life.

Then he told her to turn around and go back to the Nest. He had a plan and he would need an operative in the Usurper's household.

But all that would be meaningless if it turns out Drake was aware of his plans all along! If his past-self had learned anything pertinent, that coupled with the knowledge of their relationship that his present-day self had would be enough for the clever bastard to deduce his coup. How much did he know? Allen was adamant that they knew nothing. That he had shown up before either of them could really learn more than the current handles and maybe the names of a couple of their friends' kids. That was it. Don't worry, Demon, they don't know anything.

'For your sake, Allen, I hope you're right.'

But the Demon was still going to step up his plans. The schedule was changed. The arrival of these time-travelers would make a big disruption in the Usurper's daily grind. Maybe it would disrupt him enough to give the Demon an opening. He just needed to be there and in a position to take advantage of it. For that, he needed to get moving.

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tick-tock

.

His pen ran out of ink. Damn it.

The Commander tossed the now useless plastic stick-pen across the room. Soon, very soon now. Time was winding down, drawing ever closer to his climactic end. But before that happened he wanted to get everything down. Write down everything he remembered from the past forty years in his little blue book for his past counterpart to study and learn from. Of course, he already knew most of it would never get used. He knew because he refused to even open the blue book until after his final falling-out with Superman. Maybe if he had read it sooner that tragedy could have been avoided.

But he wouldn't think about that now. The Commander put it behind him and never looked back.

Except that he was looking back. Not just in order to write it down in this little future journal to give to his past-self, but just in general. Even since Mar'i reported the temporal disturbance that announced their arrival and heralded the beginning of his end. He though about Superman more in the past night than he had in the past twenty years. Suppressing a silent snarl, the Commander stood in search of a new pen.

It was funny. In all those end-of-the-world movies and works of fiction, people were always concerned with the big things like food, clean water, shelter, weapons, medicine, etc. Those were large concerns and did give the Commander more anxiety than he liked to remember back in the early days. But now that things have long since settled into a regular pattern, he was finding that little mundane things he used to take for granted had become rare and precious too. Things like pall-point pens that still hand ink and could write. Who would have thought that in this post-apocalyptic setting, he would pine for a pen almost as much as others might pine for a cheeseburger and fries.

Was he deflecting?

Probably.

It kept him from thinking about Superman. About that night. Or had it been a day? It was near impossible to tell days from nights in those first early years of ash and blackness. But the Commander distinctly remembered it was dark. Outside the tower and inside. He had siphoned off most of the power from the rest of the building to his cloning chamber. He had been so sure Kon would return at first. After all, Clark came back after his death. But when the days turned into weeks and the weeks turned into months, he was forced to confront the fact that his Kon was good and truly dead and not coming back. So, he turned his time, effort, resources and more than a considerable amount of genius to preserving some part of the Superboy, so that at least some small piece of his Kon would continue and survive.

The cloning process was more difficult than he imagined and the Commander quickly understood why Cadmus had to splice in human DNA. The kryptonian genotype was far to complex to be deciphered with the limited knowledge and primitive technology humans had available to them. With what he had, the Commander would never be able to make a strait-up clone. He wouldn't be able to make an exact copy of his late friend. If he wanted to produce a viable specimen, he would have to splice in some human DNA, just as Cadmus had done…

'What the fuck! What the hell is this!?'

'Wait! You don't understand!'

And then Kon did come back. It was miraculous and wonderful and the Commander could not manage to contain his elation at seeing his friend alive again. There had been a hug that lingered perhaps longer than the Commander should have let it. Then followed an awkward moment of homoerotic tension in which they said nothing and avoided each other's eyes. Then came the questions and attempts to over-simplify vastly complicated explanations for how it was possible. Followed by declarations of undying friendship. Then, the Commander uttered the one sentence he regretted more than anything else in his life.

'I want to show you something.'

He made Kon fly them back to the island that held the tower, the Team's new base of operations ever since the Mount Justice Cave had been destroyed. Holding the demi-kryptonian's hand, he lead him through the dimly lit corridors to his lab in the basement, a room the Team had long since dubbed the 'Timcave'.

Kon froze when he saw another version of himself floating suspended in a cylindrical tank of synthetic embryonic fluid. The tank stretched from the consol it was mounted on all the way up to the ceiling. The clone inside bobbed up and down, clad in a solid white solar suit similar to the one Kon himself had worn during his gestation at Cadmus, similar to the one Match wore when Kon found him, similar to the one every super-clone seemed to wear at this stage in their development. But did he notice that the Commander had replaced the trademark S in the center of the shield with his robin's head? Would he understand the significance?

'What the fuck. Tim! What the hell is this!?'

'Wait, Kon! You don't understand!'

He did not notice. Or if he did notice, he failed to understand its significance. The cylinder was smashed open, the fluid spilling out, flooding the small basement room. The clone came tumbling out with the fluid. Hitting the floor with a loud THUD that would have made Tim wince if he weren't already horror-struck by the violence of Kon's reaction. The clone's eyes opened, blinking at the world around him in the wide-eyes innocents of ignorance. There was no comprehension behind those crystal-blue eyes, so much like Kon's. Tim had not yet implemented any sort of education programs. All the clone had were the basic instincts all creatures were born with.

He tried to stand. Sitting up in the inch deep fluid that washed over the floor. But Kon knocked him back down. Held him there. Knee on the chest. Hands on the throat. The clone struggled, the instinct of survival kicking in instantly. But he didn't have TTK and Kon did. He was new and ignorant and inexperienced, having nothing more than a basic survival instinct, while Kon had experience restraining powerful foes –lots of experience- and training and programming on how to kill kryptonians. He was made to be a weapon after all. Tim had never though of him as a weapon before. Academically, he understood that was what Kon was made to be, but until that very moment, seeing the murderous rage in his eyes, his hands around their clone's throat… in that moment Tim witnessed a transformation. He became what he was always meant to be.

…and it broke his heart.

'Kon, wait! You don't understand!'

He tried to pull the Superboy off, already knowing that a mere human like himself didn't have a chance in hell against a demi-kryptonian. But he tried anyway. Kon smacked him away. Actually smacked him –hard! Tim went flying backwards, his back impacting on a wall, the back of his head hitting a control panel. A white-hot pain lanced through him and he saw stars behind his eyes. …That was the last thing Tim remembered. The next thing he was aware of was waking up in the tower infirmary, Cass, and Dick, and Steph leaning over him –all looking a little sick. He didn't need to ask them what happened. He could guess.

That was the last time Red Robin and Superboy ever saw each other. Kon permanently relocated to the Fortress of Paradise, instating an almost isolationist policy. The city-state still traded with certain territories for some necessities that they just couldn't make for themselves or substitute with kryptonian crystal tech, and then there was the occasional marriage contract to combat inbreeding between the citizens (small community that it was). But for the most part, the Fortress was an island and the Superman –he was called 'Superman' now- rarely (if ever) strayed far from his crystal citadel. Once they had been best friends, the Finest of friends… now, they were less than strangers to one another.

'Tim, promise me we'll always be friends.'

'I promise.'

'Always.'

The Commander found a pencil. He returned to his little blue book. He chose the blue journal because the cover was hard leather and durable. It would withstand the test of forty years (as his own copy had proved). But also, there was a bit of an inside joke to it as well. He forgot the name of the series, but there was a sci-fi show he liked to watch back when TV actually existed. About a funny man who traveled through time and space (and sometimes dimensions) in a magical blue box. Later in the series he met another time traveler and kept meeting her. They both kept journals –the same shade of blue as the box- to keep track of where on each other's timeline's they were. Tim's journal was a slightly darker shade of blue, but it was enough to remind him of a happier time. A time when he could make amusing references and have them go completely over Kon's head.

'I wear a cowl now. Cowls are cool.'

And Kon could just roll his eyes; not understanding because the only TV he watched was 'No Signal'. 'Your head looks like a condom.'

'Tim, promise me we'll always be friends.'

Always.

The most hated word in the English language. Always. Always didn't account for death. It didn't figure how resurrection could change a person. How the trauma of having their life end then begin again could drive them… To become what Kon became. Always…

But he should have known. Jason was a little crazy when he returned from the dead. But Clark had not been. Clark had a little PTSD, but overall was fine. Jason was insane. Kon was jealous, vindictive and murderous. Maybe it was a human thing. Humans were meant to die when they are killed. Die and stay dead. Krypronians get a second chance. Jason went crazy. Clark was fine. Kon wavered half-way between.

There was the scrape of a boot on the floor, a deliberate sound since the Commander had designed those boots himself –they were meant to be soundless, silent. The person cleared their throat conspicuously. The Commander did not turn around to face McGinnis. He just continued writing. Almost. He almost had everything down.

"I'm about to go on patrol." Said the boy.

And he really was just a boy. Seventeen. True, the Commander had been even younger than him when he first donned the Robin mantel. But now, at the age of fifty-four, seventeen seemed like a baby. What would the Demon do with McGinnis after he was gone? He supposed that would depend on Terry. He didn't know that he and the Demon were actually half-brothers (genetically speaking, of course). That McGinnis was a partial clone of the original Batman. The Commander thought about telling him more than once, but it had never seemed like a wise idea. As far as Terry knew, Warren McGinnis was his father, and he loved the memory of his father.

The Commander thought about the clone he had made. He never even gave him a name, before Kon snuffed him out. Academically, the Commander had to wonder if on some level he hadn't been replacing the clone with Terry on some subconscious level. Emotionally, he refused to admit that it was even a possibility. The clone was his. McGinnis was a Cadmus throwback he just happened to find at a critical moment.

"Are you okay?" The boy asked, lifting one ebony eyebrow at his back. "Didn't you get any sleep last night?"

"I'll sleep when I'm dead." The Commander growled. It wouldn't be long now. He took a deep breath and swiveled his chair around to face the young Batman. McGinnis stood in full uniform, sans the mask, arms crossed over his chest –studying him. He was young, still a little carefree, and had the happy influence of a living mother and younger brother. His glare did not hold the deathly seriousness or oppressive undertones that Bruce's bat-glare had. But… the hintings were there, like a shadow of the Bat marking him as an heir to the cowl. The Commander turned his chair back around and resumed his scribbling. "Take the batmobile on your patrol."

"Inside the city?" McGinnis uncrossed his arms in shock. In all his time as Batman, the Commander had never allowed the use of the batmobile inside the habitable city limits. He said there was no point in wasting the fuel when his suit and his training was more than enough transportation. The batmobile was reserved for patrolling the outer territory boarder or long-range salvages.

"I recalibrated its anti-grav thrusters for city-use last night while you were on the comm with Dina."

"Dana." He corrected. "You do that on purpose. But I thought you said-"

"Well, now I'm saying something different!" The Commander snapped, slamming his pencil down on the consol and standing. "Just do as I say and… and, I promise, you won't have to put up with me much longer."

McGinnis raised the other eyebrow at that cryptic and oddly foreboding statement, but said nothing. He pulled the cowl down over his face, turned and walked out. A few moments later, the Commander received the 'In Use' alert from the batmobile's transmitter.

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tick-tock

.

"Tim, you awake?"

"No…" The Boy Wonder groaned, pulling the handmade quilt over his head in a vain attempt to ward off the Superboy's attempts to rouse him. The Robin didn't usually approve of sleeping in unfamiliar territory but this was the Kent farmhouse, he'd had plenty of sleep-overs with Conner over the past few months –but that was the past few months back in 2016. The 2056 Kent farmhouse was vastly different and conflicting instincts were making it exceedingly difficult for the Boy Wonder to get any version of decent rest.

Kon sneaking into the room, making the old floorboards creek and the new crystals panels squeak didn't help matter's much either. The edge of the bed sank with the demi-kryptonian's weight as he sat down and Tim heard him heave a heavy sigh. "Can we talk?"

Not removing the blanket from his head, the Robin asked, "Do you mean, 'do we have the mental and physical capability to communicate verbally' or 'may we have a conversation right now at… two AM when your completely ordinary human partner needs to rest'?"

"Uh, the second one."

Tim sighed and sat-up, rubbing his eyes and yawning. "What did future-you say? You were quiet all through dinner and kept looking between him and me like one of us had the plague."

"Nothing."

Tim gave Kon his best 'I don't believe you and I'm gonna make you feel uncomfortable until you tell me' look. People didn't sneak into rooms after lights-out and ask to have hushed conversations over 'nothing'. Also, he was annoyed and irritable.

"Its just… I donno, its hard to see the connected between me and the future-me we met today. He's so…" Kon couldn't quite think of an applicable adjective to convey all his impressions of the future-him. "Tim, promise me that we'll always be friends. No matter how I react to some of the crazy shit you do or how crazy I might seem at times… just promise me we'll still get each other's backs."

"I promise." Thought, admittedly, 'always getting each other's back' and 'always staying friends' were two vastly different things and the Robin wasn't quite sure which he was promising to do.

"Always?" Kon pressed.

Okay, seriously, what did future-Kon say? "Yes, Kon, I promise, I've always got your back –so long as you don't decide you like Luthor better than Clark and join the 'Light side'."

For some reason, this did not seem to be the answer the demi-kryptonian had wanted. But Tim wasn't about to make an unconditional promise like that. What if the Superboy did decide to team-up with Luthor at some point in the future? With Lex's brains and Kon's powers, they would be a dangerous team –probably even give Bruce and Clark, the World's Finest team, a run for their money.

"But, I can promise," Tim continued, "that the person I am right now, and the person you are right now will always be friends."

Kon nodded, not really looking all that reassured, but accepting it all the same. "Always."

Downstairs, sitting at the kitchen table in a pair of old Metro-U sweatpants and a ratty T-shirt, the Superman cursed his super-hearing.

Always.

He hated that word. The most repugnant and profane word in the English language. Always.

'This is my flying!'

'Yeah, lets see if you still say that when your line snaps and you fall.'

'I won't fall. You're here to catch me. You always catch me.'

'And I always will.'

Always.

The Superman stood. Since they were both awake, he might as well take them to Gotham now. As much as he didn't want to go to that city, as much a he didn't want to risk seeing the Commander… The Superman also knew he had to. He remembered himself taking them there at ungodly our of the morning, Tim falling asleep in his arms as they flew through the air, just above the ash-clouds, he and his future counterpart soaking up the sun as it rose.

Now he was the future counterpart.

The Superman also remembered flagging down a flying vehicle just inside the city limits and being passed off to a teenager in a Bat costume. The demi-kryptonian smiled to himself. If they left right now, they would arrive in Gotham just in time for Terry to be starting his patrol. He could pass off his charges just as he remembered himself doing forty years ago and never have to speak to the Commander.

With that thought in mind, the Superman blurred upstairs to change back into his uniform and wake his time-displaced guests.

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tick-tock

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Once upon a time, back during an age when people had cars and fuel, the trip between Washington, District Colombia and Gotham would have been a five to six hour drive. Now, traveling on foot, it was considerably longer –roughly two days. But traveling by speedster, it was only a few short minutes.

"Allen, stop here."

Bart skidded to a halt, kicking up a billowing fog of dust and debris, the likes of which probably were not healthy to be breathing in. He released the hold he had on his passenger and allowed the Demon to slide off his back. Bart raised his goggles and stared at the older man in confusion.

"We're still pretty far out from the actual city." He said. "I know this all used to be Gotham, but the habitable zone's still a way's away."

"I am aware of that!" Snapped the Demon. "But if we go wizzing in and breaking the sound barrier, the Usurper will know we're here."

"Oh. Right." Bart hung his head in embarrassment for not realizing sooner.

Then shrugged his shoulders, heaving a heavy sigh. He liked working with Conner and Tim much better than the Demon. They at least had senses of humor and didn't treat every small mistake or flash of idiocy like it was a grievous crime against humanity.

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tick-tock

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Something tapped on the outer hatch of the batmobile cockpit. Terry blinked in confusion. He was sixty feet up in the air. Unless the skies were falling again, nothing should be hitting the top of the batmobile.

Then he heard it again. Two quick taps.

Tap. Tap.

Terry did an exterior hull scan, but showed up nothing. Then a close-range sensor scan. Damn. The Commander was gonna chew him out big time for missing that. Always be alert and prepared. He was prepared. Alert? Apparently, not so much…

The young Batman released the hatch and slid the cockpit canopy back. "Morning, Superman, and… other Superman?"

Behind the whited out eyes of his cowl, the Batman blinked at not one, but two Supermen flying alongside the batmobile. One of them, the one not in uniform, carried a third costumed man in his arms. Terry didn't recognize his colors.

"Got a couple of charges for you, Batman." Said Superman, the uniformed one. "The Commander will wanna see them ASAP."

Terry was about to remind the Man of Tomorrow that he knew where the Nest was and ask why he didn't just fly them there himself. But, that wasn't exactly the wisest thing to say to a guy who could fry you with and look, generally was never in a good mood outside of his Fortress, and didn't need much incentive to get violent with people that irritated. It was also a very well known fact that Superman and the Commander did not get along. Terry was still a little unclear on the details, but he did know from mediating their communications (and that barely deserved a plural) that both of them avoided speaking to one another like it was the plague.

"Alright, Superman, I'll take 'em to Nest." Terry nodded. "Can I at least know who they are? So that I can implement the appropriate security measures."

"Security level two, no immediate threat, but no free information sharing." Superman supplied. "That does not require you to know who they are."

He flew away.

The other Superman, the one in the orange jumpsuit carrying his red-clad friend, pulled in alongside the batmobile. "Uh… hi." He said. "So, where are we going?"


	6. It's the Pelvic Thrust

Time was cute.

Well, sometimes she was cute. Other times, Time could be annoying or down right infuriating. Then, sometimes, you just wanted to kill Time. Just like a woman.

Rip Hunter had actually completed the Time-Sphere several months ago –by his measure of time. With the Commander's aid and the salvaged parts and equipment from the Justice League's Watchtower he had managed to make a passably functional time machine. Then it was just a hop, skip and a jump to the 31st century to bum some better parts off of Brainy, and his passably functional time machine became a properly working Time-Sphere once again.

Why then, return to and hang out in this god-forsaken century?

Because that was the deal he made with the Commander. He gives Rip a safe workshop to construct his machine in and the parts he needs for it, and in return Rip send two people to the past for him. Then, of course, there was that small matter of that if those particular two people didn't make it back to 2016, then the present he enjoys in 3056 may not come to be. But why sweat the small stuff?

Plus, it was all in good timey-whimey wibbly-wobbly fun!

And after he returned Superboy and Robin to their own place in time, he could continue his quest to unlock Hypertime and access the multiverse.

But there was no rush.

All things happen in their own time…

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tick-tock

.

The boarder between the Gotham city habitable zone and city wastes was maintained by a light guard. They were mostly volunteers and militia, self-trained or minimal professional training. No one even close to on par with bat-clan or League of Shadows training. The Demon and Impulse slipped around their patrols and into the city easily.

The streets were a wash of dim lights. During the invasion, the major cities like Metropolis, Los Angeles, New York and Gotham were prime targets. They weren't looking to destroy, they were trying to capture human specimens. Large cities were perfect for their purposes. The cities power plants were systematically targeted and destroyed. Within a night, the major cities were blacked-out. Within a week, the rest of the nation.

But Gotham had been through something like it before, just after the quake that those old enough to remember still called 'the Cataclysm'. During the invasion, when the power went out, the city reverted back to its old gas-power system for basic things like street lights (then called 'emergency lights', now called 'running lights').

After the invasion, the people of Gotham built a new power plant over one of the rivers cutting through the island. But it was just one and could not supply the whole city with power (even as small as it had shrunk to). That power plant was devoted almost completely to the Robinson Park farmlands, supplying it with synthetic sunlight to grow the crops.

The Nest, of course, also had its own power supply. But only a small chosen few were privy to its secrets. Luckily for the Demon, prior to his exile, he was one of those chosen few.

It was laid down by his father, the original Batman, long before the invasion, back when the League and the Team thought their biggest problems were the Light and the Kroloteans. The Demon was to young to remember that. But the power source was one of the main reasons why Grayson moved the bat-clan's base to the old Wayne Tower after the mansion's destruction.

It was to the Nest that he was headed, and through a maintenance tunnel that serviced generator that he planned to get in.

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tick-tock

.

The Commander stood on the roof of the old Wayne Tower building, the one Dick had claimed for the bat-clan and converted into the Robin's Nest –now just called the Nest. He watched the figure clad in blue and red coast through the skies on an exit course out of the city. It was a kindness, he decided, for the Superman not to go strait to super-speed while still inside the city. Loud sonic booms tended to startle people into diving for their shelters or grabbing for their guns. The Commander liked to avoid that sort of thing on a daily basis and it was nice of the Man of Tomorrow to regulate his speed within the city limits.

Pulling his gun from its holster, the Commander trained the barrel on the Superman's blue-clad kidney and squeezed the trigger.

Two seconds later the figure in blue and red had vanished from his place in the sky and was instead hovering right in front of the Commander. He held out his hand and dropped a crushed lead bullet at the man's black-booted feet.

"Its lead and copper." He said. "Not kryptonite. So, I'm assuming your intention was not to kill me."

The Commander gazed up at his former friend, the Man of Tomorrow, the Superman, formerly the Boy of Steel, the Superboy, Conner Kent, Kon-El, clone boy… There was so much the Commander wanted to say to him, but suddenly, he found that words had failed him. Looking up at Superman hovering there, all that escaped his lips was, "If I wanted you dead, you'd be dead. Not hovering here making assumptions."

The muscles of Superman's face twitched asymmetrically. It was one of the (rather obvious) tells he had developed back when the Commander was still a Robin and trying to teach the Superboy how to keep a blank face. But the Commander didn't need the tell to know that, that was the wrong thing to say.

"What do you want… Commander?" Said the Superman with icy civility.

"Superman, I…" 'I don't know what to say.' "I'm sending them home tonight. You and me –the younger you and me."

"I know." Growled the Superman. "I was there."

There was a beat of silence in which both men did nothing but stare at each other. Yes, Kon had been there when they were sent back. But he hadn't been there a few minuets before. When it was just him, himself and his grim reaper.

The slash was across the chest. Deep. Lungs perforated. Unable to speak. He remembered himself clutching at Superman's blue suit. Grabbing for that black and red S-shield. Blood spurted from between his lips with the effort to speak, but no words came.

There was so much he wanted to say.

After the extended silence dragged on long enough, the Superman turned to leave.

"I forgive you!"

He froze. That bright red cape the only movement from the Superman. Then, slowly, very slowly, he turned. Face contorted in abject rage. Hands balled into fists at his sides. Arms trembling. His words were more like a snarl than actual speech when he spoke. 

"Oh, you forgive me!?" Eyes going red, a slight glow building in their centers, he drifted onto the roof and planted his feet firmly in front of the Commander. "You forgive me. You are the one who should be asking for my forgiveness. Not the other way around!"

Most people, when faced with that glowing red stare and the implied threat of a fiery death that came along with it, would pee their pants. Or at the very least take a step back. But not the Commander. He already knew Superman wasn't going to kill him. But even if he didn't, he had seen that stare to many times, directed at different people over the years, to find it intimidating. He stood his ground and met the Superman's burning eyes, not giving an inch.

"You have no idea." Continued the demi-kryptonian. "You have no idea what its like to die, but not stay dead. To claw your way through an afterlife even the most imaginative, schizophrenic, acid-dropping, mental patient couldn't envision; to fight your way back to life, then, when you finally do come back… you find out that you've been replaced. That you, you're life and everything you thought mattered to the people around you was as disposable as an old pair of shoes."

"It wasn't like that!" The Commander insisted. "I wasn't replacing you. You don't understand. You never listen."

That fuming red glow did not fade from his eyes, but he threw his arms up as if in exasperation. "I'm here now, Commander, I'm listening. Make me understand."

The Commander's throat instantly went dry. Words failed him.

"Well?" Prompted the Superman.

"I'm sorry." He finally whispered. "I'm sorry I surprised you like that. I was just so excited that you were back. I didn't think you'd react that way. I… I thought you'd be happy."

"Happy!?" The demi-kryptonian snarled.

"I never told you, because you never listen, but that clone… He wasn't a clone of you."

That red glow intensified slightly. "You expect me to swallow that crap? It looked exactly like me."

"He was created from your DNA, but he wasn't a clone, Ko- Superman." The Commander stopped himself before the name he hadn't spoken aloud in years escaped his lips. "Its true, I was trying to clone you. You had been dead for months; I thought you weren't coming back ever. But I couldn't clone you. The kryptonian genotype was too complicated. I had to splice in some human DNA, just like Cadmus had to do when they created you. Yes, you were his genetic-parent, but he wasn't your clone. At least, not just yours."

Superman was silent.

He stood there, starring at him.

"Aren't you gonna ask who the other donor was?"

Still, the Superman said nothing.

"Kon, it was me." The Commander finally told him. "I was the other donor. That clone, our clone. I made him from the combined samples of your DNA and mine. Genetically speaking, he's not your clone. He's our ch-"

"NO!" Superman all but shouted. "No! Do not say that. Do not tell me that! That is not true! That cannot be true! Don't tell me that I- that I… You don't get to do that!"

He rose into the air. Glowing eyes releasing almost-bursts of flame from the corners.

"Kon, please! I-"

"NO! You don't get to do that! You can't spurn my… you don't get to spur me, then turn around and do that! Damn it, Tim! You're really fucked up! Do you know that! 'Just friends'! That was the agreement! You and I would stay just friends. That was what you asked for. That was what you wanted. You don't get to change your mind!"

Silence followed in the wake of the Superman's words. Ash floated down around them, barely touched by the near non-existent breeze. It was all the Commander could do to stare up at his former friend. Finally, the Commander lowered his eyes.

"I'm sorry, Kon." He informed his feet. "But… I've forgiven you for killing our clone. It took me sixteen years, but I forgive you. It… it would be nice if you could forgive me too."

He looked up.

But the Superman had gone.

"I want you to forgive me, before I die." Tim Drake informed the empty air.

.

tick-tock

.

The maintenance tunnel was dark. No one ever came down this way unless they were servicing the Wayne Tower generator, and so to conserve energy, the power was cut from the tunnel most of the time. The Demon lead Impulse through the dim corridor by light of an old Colman propane lantern. Truth be told, the Demon didn't need the young speedster's help anymore now that he'd reached the city and almost inside the tower. But at the same time, he didn't want the impulsive little brat running loose and blowing his cover before he was ready. It was best to keep Allen close where the Demon could better moderate his behavior.

There were three access doors that had to be unlocked. Each had a separate code, but none of them had been changed since the time of the original Batman and the Demon knew them all. The doors opened without hassle and the pair slipped through silent and unseen.

It wasn't until they were climbing up from the tower's basement that they encountered their first incident. They weren't soldiers or even guards, just volunteers from the permanent MASH camp in the lobby of Wayne Tower. They had come to get something from the basement storage and quite literally ran smack into Impulse and the Demon.

The Demon reacted instantly, not giving the pair the chance to sound an alarm. Silencing one and disabling the other. He left them both alive, but unconscious, gagged and restrained.

They climbed up the service stair for almost twelve floors without further incident.

On the switchback between floors eleven and twelve they froze in their steps at the sound of someone else coming down the stairs. Light on their feet, and at a leisurely pace. Whoever it was wasn't in a hurry and probably not expecting to find intruders in the stairwell. The Demon pressed Impulse against the wall and drew his sword, continuing to climb the stairs slowly, one at a time, barely making a sound.

But as he came around the switchback, the Demon froze.

"Dami-!?" She blinked.

"Shit! Its Nightstar!" Impulse exclaimed.

"Beloved." The Demon sheathed his sword with a sigh of relief.

"'Beloved'?" Impulse blinked in confusion, glancing from one to the other, not understanding what he'd just heard at all.

Nightstar closed the distance between them, grabbed the Demon by the shoulders and mashed her lips against his. It was all Bart could do not to let his mouth hit the ground when he heard the Demon moan, actually moan, into Nightstar's kiss. Then they broke apart and were suddenly all business as if it had never even happened.

"You're early." She said. "The plan wasn't for until another month from now."

"Circumstances have forced me to alter the plan." Replied the Demon.

Her eyes traveled from the Demon to Impulse. "Don't tell me he's your only back-up." She said. "When are the rest of the New Shadows supposed to arrive?"

"As soon as it takes them to travel from DC to here."

Nightstar pursed her lips tensely. "So its just you, then." There was the beat of a pause, and then, "Damian, Uncle's been acting weird since yesterday. Almost like… I don't know how to describe it, but I just want to know, are you… do you plan on… killing him?"

The Demon gave her dismayed frown. "Beloved, you're not a simpleton. You know how these things work."

.

tick-tock

.

"Your ears are to long and you're missing the cape. Seriously, what kind of Batman doesn't have a cape?"

Terry grit his teeth and tried to ignore Superman's red-clad friend whom called himself the Scarlet Pimpernel. It was a little weird, Terry was sure he'd seen a copy of a book by that same title on the Commander's bookshelf once. He supposed it could be a coincidence; it was silly to assume the Commander owned the only copy left in the world. But at the same time, so few books actually survived the civil wars that followed in the wake of the invasion that it wasn't very likely to find two people who've read the same book.

The batmobile pulled into the Nest hangar. Terry could not pop the hatch soon enough and get the pair out of his uncomfortably cramped cockpit. The batmobile had not been designed with passengers in mind.

But, he still had to follow the appropriate safety protocols for all new people admitted into the Nest. That meant stripping them of all weapons and equipment until such time as the Commander decided they were safe. Terry expected them to put up a fight. Most costumes, when faced with being stripped of their weapons, became irate, even hostile. But the Scarlet Pimpernel just sighed with exasperation, as if he were very familiar with this sort of treatment.

Even curiouser was when the young Batman took the Pimpernel's belt it looked to be the same vintage style utility belt the Commander preferred to wear. Except this one was in much newer condition. It showed less wear and tear, less discoloring, less patching and repair –just all around looked newer. Terry found himself suppressing the urge to open the pouches and look through it to see what his equipment looked like. But that wasn't his job. That was a task the Commander preferred to do himself. Most curious of all, was that the Scarlet Pimpernel also carried a collapsible bo-staff –again, just like the one the Commander carried.

Hm… and this kid had arrived with Superman, the Commander's former best friend. A theory was forming in the young Batman's mind.

Illegitimate love-child maybe? The Commander's son. But with whom?

He deposited the Scarlet Pimpernel's belt and Skywalker's 'lightsaber' in a titanium lock box and carried it under his arm as he led them from the hangar into the base.

The Commander was just coming down from the roof when they entered the main monitor chamber. He paused when he saw them. Forcing his eyes to skip over the Superboy whom looked so much like his present-time's Superman (or would it be more accurate to say that Superman looked like him?), and focused his attention on his younger self. He remembered that Halloween costume. His stepmother helped him sew it. It was based off the book rather than any of the movies with a few contemporary hero elements thrown in for flavor.

He still had his original copy of The Scarlet Pimpernel. It had survived the destruction of Wayne manor only by the grace that he'd been reading it at the Team's Tower and accidentally left it there. When Dick moved the bat-clan family seat to Wayne Tower, he retrieved the book and brought it home. With no more television, internet, or very many entertainment options in general, it became the only non-Red Robin related thing he ever read. But he never really read it as completely as he used to. The Commander would always skip over the parts that described Sir Percy's exotic costumes because they reminded him of his own costume. The same thing he was wearing the night he witnessed his own death.

The Commander looked at his younger self and dreaded the fact that he would soon be traumatized in a way that couldn't really be fully understood or treated.

His eyes drifted to Terry and the lock box containing his belt the boy carried under his arm. The Commander finished his decent and walked right up to the junior Dark Knight. "Thank you, Batman, I'll take that. Go refuel the Batmobile. I'll need you to take them to Rip Hunter's workshop once I'm done debriefing them."

The Batman absentmindedly handed the box off to his Commander while starring at him as if he didn't understand. "Did you… did you just say 'thank you'!? Old man, are you alright?"

"Get out!" Snarled the Commander.

The Batman retreated back into the hangar.

The Commander slumped down in a chair. He pulled the titanium box onto his lap and unlocked it. Flipping it open, he pulled out his younger self's utility belt and tossed it to him. "Here."

Tim just caught it and refastened the belt about his waist without even thinking about what he was doing. The young Boy Wonder was so busy starring at the Commander. All this time he had thought that it would be Bruce or Dick, but the tired looking man sitting in front of him was neither. He wore a variation of the batsuit. Cap and cowl, leather and kevlar, all black. But he was to young to be Bruce Wayne. Bruce would be in his late seventies by now. This man couldn't be older than his mid-fifties. But he wasn't Dick either, the chin and nose were all wrong.

As if guessing his thoughts, the Commander flashed him an ironic smile. "Come now, Tim, its simple process of elimination. It can't be that hard to figure out who I am."

"Huh?" The Superboy blinked, looking from one to the other as if he'd somehow missed half a conversation.

Behind his Scarlet Pimpernel mask, Tim's eyes went wide. "You're me!"

The Commander nodded. He reached his hands up, hooking his thumbs beneath the cowl, he pulled the mask back from his face to reveal tired old eyes, set in a battle hardened and scared face that sported more frown-lines than Tim felt it should. The eyes were still a vivid cobalt, however, and they fixed the younger Robin with a solid and critical stare.

"I'm you." He confirmed.

Then his gaze shifted to the Superboy. The change in expression when he looked at the demi-kryptonian was subtle. A slight down-turn of the corners of the mouth, a small shift in the angle of his eyebrows. If Kon didn't already know what to look for, he wouldn't have seen it. But he did know, his older self told him what he'd done –what both of them had done- to end their friendship. He saw how it affected his future counterpart, now looking at the older Tim, he saw how it affected him too. While Superman was jaded, bitter and angry –all burnt-up and slightly hollow on the inside- the Commander was tired and frail, having internalized all his feelings and slowly being crushed under their weight.

"It's been a long time, Kon." He said.

The Superboy had no idea what to say to that. He knew what happened between himself and Tim but didn't have any idea how he should respond. He wasn't his future-self and he was pretty sure future-Tim knew that, but he didn't know what future-Tim wanted from him.

It wasn't Tim's fault. Not entirely. Future-Kon was responsible for his own actions. But because it was Tim, he wouldn't see it that way. Well, he would see it that way academically but not emotioanlly. Academically, he would understand that future-Kon's reaction wasn't his fault. He wasn't to blame. He didn't force future-Kon to commit murder. But because it was Tim and because Tim always experienced things in two ways, academically and emotionally, he wouldn't be able to fully accept that. He would internalize the issue. Take all future-Kon's blame and anger and turn it back on himself, because that's just what Tim did.

The Superboy wanted to make it better. But he had no idea what to do or say.

"I…" He began, unsure. "Tim, we promised we'd always have each other's backs. So, you should know, even if I'm mad at you… I've got your back. Okay?"

Kon had no idea if that was the right thing to say or not. But it didn't exactly seem like the wrong thing. At least, future-Tim didn't become pissy and blow-up at him. But then again, Tim never really was the type to have big emotional blow-outs. He was more of the type that would sit and scheme and plan payback, rather than give into a big melodramatic episode. Melodramatic episodes were more Kon's thing then they were Tim's.

The Commander gave a forlorn smile. Running gloved hands through stringy gray hair, he said, "It would be nice if you did."

He swiveled his chair around to pull open a drawer just below the main console's tabletop. From this drawer, he withdrew what looked like a journal bound in blue leather. The Commander stood and crossed the room, placing a commanding hand on his younger self's shoulder.

"I need to speak to you privately."

.

tick-tock

.

The service stair let out into the hangar.

The Demon was not expecting to find anyone there. Mar'i hadn't told him the Bat-Fake would be working on the batmobile. The vehicle wasn't even supposed to be used within the city. It was a waste a fuel they couldn't afford. That had been Dick's rule and both Damian and the Usurper continued to follow it after his passing. The batmobile was reserved for long-distance recon and territory boarder patrol. Not patrol within the city. But there was the Bat-Fake, refilling the ethanol tanks and making sure the anti-grav treads were calibrated for city use.

The Demon stepped out from the stairwell. Drawing his sword silently.

He crept softly up behind the Bat-Fake.

But the young Batman was also a son of Bruce Wayne, though he did not know it, and like his genetic-parent was simultaneously blessed and cursed with an over-awareness of his surroundings. He did not have the enhanced senses of a kryptonian. The young Batman could not hear either his heartbeat or his breathing, nor the near silent step of padded boots on the floor. It could have been a shift in the air or the creak of the stairwell door, but it was none of these things either. It was just a prickling on the back of his neck, as of a nameless faceless danger.

The Bat-Fake did not turn to look at the Demon. He simply leaned to the side just as the sword stroke fell and then rolled under the batmobile. Out of the immediate danger, he took a moment to demand, "How did you get in here!?"

"It wasn't that hard."

The Demon jumped up onto the batmobile then down on the opposite side. He slashed again at the Bat-Fake but nettlesome little brat just rolled back under the hovercar. The Demon grit his teeth in annoyance and bit back the urge to swear in Arabic.

"Damian, stop! Don't hurt him." Mar'i appeared in the hangar. Impulse was out of sight. The little speedster probably zoomed off the moment Demon was distracted by the Bat-Fake. He wouldn't see him again until the brat got hungry.

"Stay out of this!" The Demon snarled at her. "That cowl should be mine!"

Out from under the Batmobile, the young Batman sent a batarang sailing low over the ground, aimed at the Demon's feet. Distracted by Nightstar, it caught him in the armored ankle of his book. Thrown off balance, the Demon fell to his knees. The Batman rolled out from under the Batmobile, ready to take the fight head-on.

He pounced on the Demon. But the exiled prince leaned backwards, placing his uninjured foot to the Bat-Fake's abdominal, the Demon used the boy's own momentum to propel him safely over his head.

Terry clattered to the floor, open and exposed. He scrambled to reclaim a standing position and defend himself, but the Demon was on him faster than he could move. The Batman suddenly found himself pined to the floor, the Demon on top of him, holding him down. One hand pried the mask form his face while the other closed around his throat.

"The Batman mantle is mine!" The Demon snarled.

"Nightstar…" Terry croaked, blue eyes starring wildly. "Mar'i, help!"

"Damian, don't kill him!" Mar'i insisted.

"Stay out of this, Beloved."

"He's your brother!"

Both men froze. The hand around Terry's throat slackening. Both men stared at her in disbelieving confusion. "What?" Both men choired in perfect unison. "No he's not."

"Father disappeared and mother passed away before this dreg was even born."

"Warren McGinnis is my father, and I'm pretty sure my mother never would have given birth to this dreg!"

Mar'i sighed with relief. They were focusing on her, not trying to kill each other. That was good. She took a deep breath, not sure if she was the right person to explain. "Terry's a partial clone. Cadmus used some of Gramps' DNA that they had on ice to try and manufacture a new Batman. But after Cadmus was destroyed their project went unfinished. Uncle found out about it when he was going through the old files they managed to salvage. I'm sorry, Terry. You weren't supposed to know. Damian, please, don't hurt him. He's not your enemy, he just wants what's best for Gotham."

The two men glanced from her back to each other.

"I can't deal with this right now." So, the Demon knocked him out. He didn't kill the Bat-Fake, just made sure he'd stay out of the way until he was done with the Usurper and could put aside some time for good and proper explanations and a well-deserved freak-out. "Mar'i, you're in charge of him until I'm done with Drake."

.

tick-tock

.

With the his future self's strong hand on his shoulder, Tim was lead out of the main monitor chamber into a side room just off the corridor from the hangar. The little Robin was shoved inside and the Commander shut the door behind them. He turned to his younger counterpart and practically shoved his blue book into the boy's hands.

"Take this." He ordered, as if in a hurry.

"What is-"

"Spoilers." The Commander replied. He had one hand to the door as if expecting any moment for someone or something to barge through it. "All the spoilers you'll need between November of 2016 and this moment."

Tim stared at him as if he'd suddenly grown a second head, or if he were insane. "Are you sure it's a good idea to give me this?" he asked. "You do still remember all the Greek mythology I read in school, right?"

"If you're referring to the self-fulfilling prophesies of Delphi and how by trying to avoid their futures, people only end-up causing them, yes I remember. But that's not what this is. That, that you hold in your hands, is hope that this future won't happen."

Tim looked back down at the book in his hands. Blue, like the Blue Lantern Corps. The power ring of hope. Hope was blue. And it was blue like the TARDIS from Doctor Who. Blue like River Song's book of spoilers. His own book of spoilers.

"Look, we can debate this all day. But I don't have that time." The Commander bent down to be on eye-level with his younger counterpart. "Read it if you want to read it. Don't read it if you don't want to read it. I know how powerful the information in that book will be and I know how dangerous power is. Just keep it for now."

Against his better judgment, Tim found a space for the journal on his belt.

"Good man." His future counterpart nodded. "Now listen, because this is very important. Hell Spores. They're what make the fire pits. But they're also what you need to use to destroy Apokolips and save Earth. Use their own technology against them. Do you understand? Hell Spores! Don't forget!"

It was all Tim could do to nod along. "Hell spores. Okay. Apokoliptan technology. Save Earth. Got it."

The Commander sighed, his shoulders sagging. "Good. Everything else I've written in the book. But whether you read it or not, you have to know how to beat Apokolips or else no one will live to see even this bleak present. Hell Spores. Remember that."

"I'll remember." Tim promised himself.

"Okay, now listen. The last thing you need to know is about Kon." He paused, gathering his words and unsure of what exactly to say. "One of these days, Kon is going to-"

Whatever he was going to say was cut off sharply and suddenly by the door behind him suddenly bursting open. It caught the Commander in the back, knocking the wind out of him. The old man stumbled forward, caught himself quickly, and turned to face the intruder. He shoved the younger, time-displaced Robin behind him as he drew a gun from his belt.

A glock-pisotl. What the hell was his future self doing with a glock-pistol!? Forget that. What was his future counterpart doing with any gun at all!? Bruce hated guns. It was a gun that killed his parents and so the Batman never used guns. The bat-clan did not use guns!

The glock fired impotently into the ceiling as the man entering the room ducked low and rushed forward to tackle the Commander. It was then that Tim recognized the intruder as the Demon that he'd met in the League of New Shadows camp.

"Drake!" He snarled, knocking the gun from the older man's hand. He kicked the Commander back a few paces and drew his sword, holding it at the man's throat. "I hope you've washed your neck because I've come for your head."

From the street below, dim light bled through the open window giving the blade an almost silver sheen.

The Commander did not seem the least bit bothered by the razor sharp blade pointed almost bulls eye on his Adam's apple. "I was hoping you'd give me a bit more time." He confessed. "At the very least, could you wait until he leaves?" The Commander nodded to his younger counterpart. "Children shouldn't have to see what we're about to do."

The Demon shifted his gaze just enough to see Tim crouching behind his future counterpart, one hand already in his belt, searching for a weapon. His attention was distracted for a moment, only a moment, but it was all the Commander needed to draw his bo-staff and knock the Demon's sword away. The staff was a blunt weapon and would deal a great deal of pain, but not cause much damage, however, it was longer than the sword and kept the Commander's enemy at a semi-safe distance.

"I should have killed you back when we were children, Drake!" The Demon practically spat at him. "I might be better off killing your younger self now and saving me the trouble later on."

Robin drew his own bo-staff at the threat, ready to defend himself. But the Demon made no move towards him. His focus remained fixed on the Commander.

"Tim!" Shouted his future self. "Get out of here. Don't look back, don't watch. Just go! There's a time machine in the old Gotham Gazette building. Have Kon fly you both there and go home!"

The Robin registered the information and stored it in his mind. But he did not leave the room. If his older self had been preparing for this event for the past forty years, then a few more minuets wouldn't matter. He would help himself defeat the Demon, then go home. What did a few minuets matter when you could travel through time anyway?

The room was dim. Lit only by the gas street lights from the city below the tower and a few lamps from the building facing the window. The dim light turned the steel and carbon-fiber of their weapons a ghostly shade of silver and Tim was reminded of so many of his night missions with Bruce and Dick, or even some of his solitary patrols. He was going up against an enemy of unknown skill, in a dark and enclosed space. So many of his missions seemed to end in a dark warehouse in the Narrows or by the shipping docks. Already, Tim felt like he was back at home in his proper time. The man in front of him wasn't his future-self but Bruce in a different costume.

The Demon lunged forward with his sword.

But the Commander blocked the blow with his staff.

Tim came around him and got a good hit to the Demon's kidney.

The Demon snarled in pain and retreated a few steps, swearing in Arabic. Tim noted the language and filed it in the back of his mind to help him deduct the villain's identity when he returned to his own time. The Demon was injured and had given ground, but the Commander wasn't pressing the advantage. Why wasn't he pressing his advantage. Bruce would not have hesitated! Instead, he tried to reason with the man.

"We don't have to do this!" Said the Commander. "Dick wouldn't want this."

"Grayson is gone, Drake!" The Demon snarled back. "What he would have wanted is immaterial! You took my birthright from me! For that, I'll kill you!"

Tim paused a moment to analyze that exchange of dialogue. The Demon knew Dick as Dick, not a Robin or Nightwing and it was already well established that he knew Tim as both Tim Drake and the Commander. But the interesting thing was that 'birthright' comment. Was the Demon Dick's son? Oh shit! Dick was gonna be a baby-daddy! Who was the mother? Maybe Zatanna? No. Can't think about that right now. There will be plenty of time to posit scenarios once he was safely back in his own time. Right now he had to keep his head in the game. There was a battle going on.

At first, Tim only saw it out the corner of his eye. A flash of silvered steel in the dim light, accompanied by the SHEEING of a sharpened blade slicing through air.

He turned to look and horror filled him.

There was a splash of blood. Then his older self was falling backwards. Fresh blood flowed form an open well on his chest where the sword had cut him.

Tim was struck speechless. The only sound he could make was a muted croak of disbelief. He hadn't been paying attention. This is what he gets for not paying attention. He could have done something to save himself if he weren't so focused on deducing the Demon's identity.

There was the sound of breaking glass and a rush of air as something else entered the room. Something fast. No. Someone fast.

The Commander fell backwards, but before he could hit the floor, was caught in the blue spandex clad arms of Kon. Future-Kon, that is. Superman.

"Tim!" He shouted. "I don't forgive you, but I've got your back!"

The younger Tim stared at them. It was his front that needed protecting, you idiot! He wasn't aware that he'd spoken aloud. Shouted, actually. But then the Superman looked up at him.

"Tim…" He said, crystal-blue eyes shining in the darkness. Then he turned back to the Commander bleeding in his arms. "My god! You knew this would happen!"

.

tick-tock

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	7. That Drives You Insane

The Superman did not waste time after his conversation with the Commander on the roof of the old Wayne Tower building. He sped-off, back to the Fortress of Paradise the moment he'd cleared the limits of Gotham city's habitable zone.

Safe, back in the familiar Kent farmhouse, he stripped off his Superman uniform and exchanged it for a pair of ratty sweatpants and a T-shirt. He hid from the revelation the Commander had given him and the feelings such a disclosure stirred in him. Anger. It seemed like he was always angry whenever he thought about Tim anymore. Dismay. It was just one simple fact that he'd learned, but it was such a large fact and changed so much that Kon didn't really know what to think. Guilt. Above all else, guilt.

He buried his guilt and other roiling emotions in cornbread with butter. It wasn't as good as apple pie, but it was the best thing he could hope for.

Kon finished his slice of cornbread faster than he'd anticipated and picked at the crumbs despondently. He tried not to think about the Commander, about Tim, about the clone –their clone.

Kon felt sick.

He zoomed upstairs and vomited into the toilet.

The thing he killed wasn't his replacement, it was his offspring. Or rather, the closest approximation to an offspring that he'd ever have.

Kon always knew he was sterile. It said as much in his original Cadmus file (yes, they had tested that). It had bothered him a little while he was still with M'gann, she always wanted a big family with lots of children (though, even if he weren't sterile, there was still some question as to whether or not they could procreate with each other). When he was with Tana he never even thought about it at all. She was so career driven and independent, motherhood would not have suited her. Cass he hadn't been with long enough for the subject to come up. Neither of them ever thought about it, so they never discussed it, so Conner never considered it.

During those years of celibacy between relationships, he did think about it.

He watched Roy (clone-Roy) with little Lian, saw how happy the little girl made him and he envied the other clone. The Superboy silently demanded the universe explain to him why a purebred-human clone could have children, but a hybrid one could not. He helped Wally baby-sit for Dawn and Don Allen –the Tornado Twins. The speedster twins were exhausting, but he still enjoyed playing with them. Even when they asked difficult questions, the answers to which he would never give to anyone under the age of fourteen. Dick called on him a lot too, when Mar'i started flying and he needed a bit of help keeping his very headstrong and stubborn toddler grounded. Heck! He even sat for Artemis and Cameron's daughter a couple of times!

But never any children of his own.

The demi-kryptonian couldn't have children of his own.

But Tim had solved that problem. Then, he killed it. Killed him, not it.

Kon had lovers of all kinds. Aliens, reporters, demi-goddesses… 'Pansexual' was the term Red Robin used. He could be attracted to anything if he wanted.

He hadn't planned on falling for his best friend, it had just sort of happened. Pansexual. He could like everything if he wanted. Kon wasn't usually shy with his feelings –not once he was actually sure of them, at least. If he liked someone, he told them (in one way or another). Whether it was a kiss right after surviving a near-fatal undercover mission in a prison, or just simply talking to one another ('Cass, I like you and I think you like me to. We should stop dancing around this and just go out.'), he made his feelings know. But with Tim it had been different. With Tim he had been scared shitless. Because it was Tim! Overly analytical and emotionally repressed Tim.

And his best friend.

What if he ruined their friendship by confessing? He had been to the future and knew they weren't friends anymore. But then, he had also told himself why they weren't friends anymore and it had nothing to do with bromance.

Three times, Kon tried to explain his feelings to Tim. Not exactly 'confess' in the strictest sense of the word, just make it known that he was starting to want more out of their relationship. Three times he tried, and three times he failed to accurately convey his meaning to the Red Robin. Finally, as he had done with M'gann so many years before, at the end of a near-fatal mission, he simply grabbed the former Boy Wonder and mashed their lips together in a sloppy kiss.

Tim pushed him away.

Kon wasn't used to being rejected by his romantic interests. He was the Superboy, after all, and had one of the sexiest and most desirables bodies of anyone on the Team (even if said body was permanently stuck at the age of sixteen). Not to mention, he was a nice guy, liked to listen and actually did enjoy long walks on the beach at sunset. Wasn't that what people liked in a partner? None of his exes had ever complained.

Tim apologized and tried to explain. It wasn't because they were both men. He wasn't homophobic. It was because Tim just didn't have any interest in physical intimacy, one way or another. 'Asexual', he called it.

It figured.

The one pansexual on the Team just had to fall for the only asexual on the Team.

That settled it. The universe hated him.

And yet… Tim might be 'the one that got away'. The one romantic interest he never got with… But he was also the one to give Kon a child. Out of all his other loves, aliens, humans, demi-goddesses, enemy soldiers… Tim was the mother of his offspring. And he went and killed it –him.

'I've forgiven you for killing our clone. It took me sixteen years, but I forgive you.'

Oh, Tim. How could Tim forgive him? Fuck! How could Kon ever forgive himself?

He couldn't.

Plain and simple.

Kon was also sure that if he kept thinking about this, he was going to end-up puking his guts out again. He needed to do something else. Distract himself. Not think. Something mindless. Meditative.

The Superman stepped outside.

The ground under his bare feet was warm for the season. He'd have to say something to Clark-Peter about that. Temperature regulation was important inside the dome. He put it out of his mind for the moment and assumed tadasana, the 'mountain pose', the first pose in the Surya Namaskar yoga set. Taking a deep breath, Kon began circling his prana, focusing his energies inward towards self-awareness and meditation. Then he shifted into urdhva hastasana. The Superman ran through the Surya Namaskar three times before he started to feel calm once again.

It was funny. Tim was the one that had first introduced him to yoga. It was what helped him realize his tactile telekinesis. After the discovery of the new power, it was Tim that helped him understand and control his ability.

It was always Tim…

When Kon's kryptonian powers began manifesting (much to everyone's surprise), Clark tried to take charge. Tried to teach him how to use and control them. But it was Tim and all his not-experiments (they were totally) that helped Kon master the abilities. Tim completed him in a way that he didn't know he was deficient until he was improved and perfected. It was like, when Tim looked at him, he didn't see what he was, but rather, what he could be. Tim saw his potential. Tim nurtured that potential but never exploited it. (At least, never to the best of Kon's knowlage.)

He was thinking about him again.

Damn.

Kon flopped down on the bare ground in savasana, the corps pose. He stared up at the seemingly infinite blue sky of the Fortress of Paradise. It wasn't infinite, of course. It wasn't even a sky. It was the image of a sky projected on the dome. One perfect summer's day. The sky always looked the same inside Paradise. At least, the daytime sky did. For night it changed between summer and winter. Different stars were visible during each season and Kon made sure the techs that worked under Clark-Peter used the right projection during the right season.

That had actually been Tim's idea, too. Way back before he'd ever even built the Fortress of Paradise. It came up in a conversation about Clark's terrariums inside the Fortress of Solitude. The Fortress of Paradise was like one big terrarium. A bio-dome. It seems like all of Kon's good ideas actually stemmed from Tim. He was his better half.

Just… not in that way…

And, he was thinking about him again.

Heaving a dejected sigh, Kon did something he hadn't done in almost twenty years. He craned his hearing, searching through all the white-noise of the planet for that one unique heartbeat, that particular breathing pattern, that specific voice that was Tim. There was once a time when he always kept one ear crooked to listen for him. His pulse, his breath, his voice. If Tim needed him, Kon would know and be ready to rush to the Red Robin's aid at the drop of a pin.

But that was years ago. A little over sixteen years, actually. Almost twenty years. Kon hadn't listened for Tim since that night.

But he was listening now. He listened to the sound of two almost identical heartbeats, the only variation being that one had a slight heart-murmur that came with age. Two identical breathing patterns, one slightly more nervous than the other. Two voices, one older, one younger, but still reflecting each other like two parts of the same whole.

"Hell Spores. Remember that."

"I'll remember."

So, that was how Tim knew how to beat Apokolips. At the time, Kon had just thought it was because Tim was just that brilliant and clever. To use their own weapons and technology against them. To save Earth with the very same thing that was destroying it. There was a kind of dark poetry to it. But as it turned out, Tim wasn't all that brilliant, he told himself what he needed long before Darksied's Elite ever arrived. All his Tim did was figure out how to use it. (Which was still pretty clever and brilliant.)

"Okay, now listen. The last thing you need to know is about Kon."

If the Superman had been moving, he would have froze. Did Tim tell Tim? Did Tim know all along? And know, had still chosen too…? No. Tim was many things, but stupid was not one of them. Tim was going to say something else about him. Tell his younger counterpart some other mundane (or at the very least, less significant) detail about their past, the boy's future.

"One of these days, Kon is going to-"

The words were cut off sharply and suddenly before the statement could be completed. Kon sat bolt upright as both heartbeats spiked in alarm. Their breaths quickening with sudden nerves. Something had happened to prevent Tim from warning his younger self about them. With glittering horror, Kon remembered Tim's parting words on the roof of the Nest building not even an hour ago.

'I want you to forgive me, before I die.'

No! Tim would not die. Tim Drake was not aloud to die before Kon had the chance to fully forgive him for his part in their tragedy. And especially not before Kon could forgive himself! According to Kon-logic, Tim's continued existence (and good health) were essential for his own mental and emotional recovery. Within moments, the Superman had once again changed out of his sweatpants and T-shirt and back into his uniform, black and red S bold on his chest in its background of deep blue.

"I was hoping you'd give me a bit more time. At the very least, could you wait until he leaves? Children shouldn't have to see what we're about to do."

In less time than it took to exclaim 'Great Scott!' Kon sped from the Fortress of Paradise back to Gotham. He slowed down just outside of the habitable zone's limits. Even if his life was in danger, Tim would still bitch about him making sonic booms and scarring the people of Gotham shitless. Nag. Nag. Nag. But then, he wouldn't be Tim if he didn't.

"Tim! Get out of here. Don't look back, don't watch. Just go! There's a time machine in the old Gotham Gazette building. Have Kon fly you both there and go home!"

They were in a little used room on the top floor of the tower. Older Tim, younger Tim and Damian. Of course it would be Damian.

"We don't have to do this! Dick wouldn't want this."

Kon didn't listen for Damian's reply. All he heard was the SHEEING of a sword blade slicing air, the SPURT of blood, and the Superman knew he was to late. He burst through a window, just in time to catch the Commander as he fell backwards, an open would in his chest, blood flowing from it freely.

'I won't fall. You're here to catch me. You always catch me.'

'And I always will.'

Always. Kon did catch him. But it was to late to stop the Commander's fall.

"Tim! I don't forgive you!" He shouted, though his face was only inches from the other man's. He couldn't die until Kon forgave him. The Superman wasn't going to let him die until he forgave him.

'Promise me we'll still get each other's backs.'

"I've got your back!" Kon proclaimed.

"It was his front that needed protecting, you idiot!"

The Superman looked up at the Robin, as if just seeing him for the first time, or suddenly remembering that he was there. Tim's younger self. Tim's past self. At the age of fourteen, Tim had witnessed his own death!

"Tim… My god!" He gasped. "You knew this would happen!"

The older Tim's mouth moved, his chest convulsed with the effort to speak, blood spurted from between his lips. But no words came.

"Shh. Save your strength." Commanded the Superman. Then, to the younger, he said, "Tim, don't look. Just go! Go!"

And using his TTK, Kon pushed the time displaced Robin out the door and away from the room. The Commander was right, the younger Tim shouldn't have to see this. Oh, god! Forty years! For forty years he knew he was going to die tonight, and he said nothing! Nothing! If he had said something… if Kon had known… Would it have changed anything between them? What if and maybe. They were useless sentiments. They didn't matter. The only thing that mattered was this moment.

So much was left unsaid.

A clap of the Demon's hands drew the Superman's attention back to him. Damian. Bruce Wayne's only natural son… and the only one of them that was the least like the original Batman. "Wonderful performance." He said. "You'd fit in nicely in an Offenbach operetta. Now, sorry if I get your suit dirty."

Damian raised the sword to finish the kill.

"No!" With a burst of TTK, the Demeon was thrown to the opposite side of the room. His back impacted the far wall, knocking the wind out of him. "You will not touch him!"

The Superman lifted the bleeding and unconscious, half-dead Commander up into his arms. He enveloped Tim's body in his TK field, using his telekinetic power to hold the wound closed as best he could. When he was sure the speed of the flight wouldn't cause any extra stress or damage to the man's already frail body, he took off. Faster than a speeding bullet. Out of the city. Back to Paradise. The only think to announce his passing was the sonic boom as he broke the sound barrier.

"Tim Drake doesn't die today!" He informed the limp body in his arms. "You're not aloud to die. You don't get to do that!"

.

tick-tock

.

Outside in the corridor, the young Robin stood dazed for a moment. So much had happened so quickly. Even his mind was slow to catch up.

Tim pushed on the door, trying to get back into the room and offer what help he could to his future counterpart. But he couldn't even touch the handle. The Superman must have thrown up a force field over the door to keep him out. Stupid tactile telekinesis. Even forty years in the future, Kon was still the same obnoxious Kon.

'Just go!' Both himself and the future-Kon had said. Go get his Kon. There was a time machine in the Gazette building. Fly there and go home.

In a slight daze, probably suffering a bit from shock, Tim turned down the corridor and headed back to the main monitor room to find his Kon.

The Superboy was sitting at one of the smaller monitors, his feet resting up on the console, the screen displaying nothing but static. A small tag in the bottom left hand corner proclaimed 'No Signal…' in black and white text.

It was almost a surreal moment for Tim. To walk from so much action and violence, from the vision of his own death scene, and into the calm and mundane setting of Kon watching TV (or a close approximation to TV) on a monitor screen. All relaxed, as if he hadn't a care in the world. It created a disconnect. Made Tim feel like he was jumping between moments of someone else's life rather than experiencing his own in a more linear form. He leaned against the doorframe, suddenly disoriented.

Kon looked up from his static. "Hey, what'd future-you say?" He asked. "Anything about me? Tim…? Tim, are you okay?"

Seeing his friend leaning in the doorway, the Superboy leapt from his chair and crossed the room to him.

Tim waved off the demi-kryptonian's help. He wasn't injured, just in shock. In an attempt to calm his nerves, the Robin took a deep breath, held it in for the count of ten, then exhaled slowly. When he had enough control over himself to speak without shaking, he said, "I know how to get us home. C'mon, you can fly us out through the hangar."

The Boy Wonder turned back down the corridor, following the same path they'd taken to the monitor room when Batman first brought them to the Nest.

"Okay…" The Boy of Steel followed after him. "But what happened between you and the other you? You don't look so good. What did he say?"

"Not now, Kon!" Tim snapped.

When they got to the hangar, they found the woman Bart had called 'Nightstar' leaning over an unconscious Batman –his mask off. They froze. Tim drew his staff. Kon assumed a defense stance.

"What did you do to him?" They demanded.

Nightstar looked up, her cloud of bark hair wafting behind her. Her solid green eyes narrowed at them as she stood. "You look like Superman, but I recognize your colors from the Justice Crater. Who are you? How did you get in here?"

All three looked ready to fight at the first wrong answer spoken. But before any of them had the chance to, there was a rush of air and suddenly Impulse was standing on top of the batmobile, drawing everyone's attention.

"Whoa there!" Said the speedster. "I think y'all need to do some introductions! Nighstar, they're from the past. That's a younger Superman and your uncle."

"What?" She blinked.

"What? Uncle!?" Tim echoed.

"Superboy, Robin, that's Dick's daughter."

"What!" Tim repeated.

"Who's Dick?" Asked Kon.

Damn it, Bart! Stop blowing secret identities like they were balloons at a midway carnival game!

"Oh. That hasn't happened yet? Sorry. Dick is Nigh-"

"Alright! Alright! Alright! Everyone just hang on a minuet!" Tim stepped in before the Impulse could blow Dick's identity –again! "We don't have time for this! Superboy and I need to get back to our own time. The Commander said there's a time machine in the Gazette building. Are you gonna let us go or not?"

"The Time-Sphere." Nodded Dick's daughter. She sat back down next to the unconscious Batman. "Go. I guess this is why you've been having Mr. Hunter building it all this time."

"Thanks." Tim climbed into the Superboy's arms. "C'mon, Kon. Lets fly."

"Uh, right." The demi-kryptonian enveloped the Boy Wonder in his TK field and lifted up into the air. Shooting out of the open hangar bay doors, he flew over the crumbling tops of dingy towers of Gotham's cityscape. "Just tell me where to go."

.

tick-tock

.


	8. Do the Time Warp Again

Rip was pulling the colored stickers off a rubix cube and replacing them on the correct sides to 'solve' the puzzle when they breezed in through the window. Superboy, dressing neck-to-toe in a bright orange jumpsuit of a Star Wars X-wing pilot, with Robin in his arms, dressed fully in red with the device of a small flower on his chest –the costume of the Scarlet Pimpernel.

"We heard you have a time machine." Said the demi-kryptonian.

The Boy Wonder was silent as he claimed out of the Superboy's arms. Shock. Rip decided after a moment's study. He probably just came from the confrontation with Damian. Poor kid. But he wasn't supposed to know that.

"Psh, 'time machine'." He scoffed instead. "That's so twenty first century. What I have, gentlemen, is a Time-Sphere! Much more sophisticated, can travel through time and space. Its nice, that means we don't have to appear in the same location as we are right now only forty years ago. I'm sure all the reporters that would be working here at the time would just love it if a freaking 'time machine' materialized right in the middle of their bull-pen."

In a slight daze, not speaking to anyone in particular, the Robin said in an odd monotone, "We've seen no indication in this time that temporal displacement or 'time travel' was confirmed and disclosed to the mass public prior to Impulse and Nathaniel Tyron's breakthrough on February the twenty-eighth."

The Superboy glanced at his friend with concern. "Are you sure you're okay? You're acting weird. I mean, weird for you."

Tim was slow in answering, which was also strange for him. But before the Boy wonder could string together enough words to form the sentence 'I'm fine.' there was a rush of air and Bart Allen was suddenly standing on the Superboy's other side.

"Did you leave yet!? Don't leave without me, I still have a mission in the past."

At the young speedster's appearance, Rip pinched the bridge of his nose to stave off what would undoubtedly turn into a headache. He ran a hand through his thick blond hair, he was gonna be hearing from Matt Ryder about this wasn't he? To the Impulse he said, "You do know why you got sent back to the future in the first place, right? This is where you're supposed to be. You can't change the past."

"Or the future." And the Robin seemed to flinch at his own words. "Attempts to alter events that have already occurred through process of time travel would result in a Barjavel Paradox and nullify both the actions taken and results altered. More likely scenarios are that attempting to alter events invariably cause them –self-fulfilling prophesy."

One gloved hand drifted to his belt to stroke one specific pouch. It looked to hold a rectangular object with hard edges that was just barely able to fit inside it. Other than that, Kon couldn't tell what Tim had in his belt without X-ray vision.

"Right…" Bart shrugged. "Anyway I'm still going with you guys! Now lets hurry up and get this show on the road!" The impulsive little speedster zipped to the other side of the room where a large semi-transparent sphere sat, a convex hatch open and lowered to the ground like a gangplank. "Is this the thing! This is way more sophisticated than what Nathan and I built! Hey, how does it work!?"

"Don't touch anything!" Rip shouted and rushed to his Time-Sphere.

"I guess that's our cue to get going." And the Superboy took a step towards the time machine, but paused when he saw that Tim was no longer paying attention. He was staring out the window, across the city at the Nest building. "Hey, Tim, you in there? You sure you're alright? Did future you tell you anything… shocking? Listen, if he did, it'll be okay. I promise, if it was about me, its not gonna happen. I'm not gonna do that. Okay?"

Slowly, the Boy Wonder turned to look at the demi-kryptonian. "He… I… He was about to tell me something about you." Admitted the Robin. "But- but he got cut off." A shadow fell over his face, but it was there and gone in a second. Kon could almost see his friend shoving whatever it was into a tiny compartment in the back of his mind to visited and examined later (if at all). "Its for the best, probably. People shouldn't know their own futures."

Kon's eyes darted from his face back down to his hand, which was still stroking that one pouch on his belt. Kon didn't have Clark's X-ray vision, so he couldn't just look through and see what it was. But judging from the shape, the strait lines and hard edges, it was either a box or a book. Something future-Tim had given him, maybe? Should he ask about it?

"Hey! Are you two coming, or what?" Bart called from inside the Time-Sphere.

"We better get going." Kon gave his friend's shoulder a reassuring squeeze before they both made their to the time machine and climbed inside.

With a soft hydraulic hiss the hatch was sealed behind them and all four men were trapped within the perfect bubble.

"Alright!" Rip fiddled with brightly colored dials and switches as he smiled. "Lets get you back to the past in time to take your mom to the Enchantment Under the Sea dance!"

"Huh?" Three sets of eyes blinked at him in confusion.

"Oh. To save Sarah Conner from the T-800, then." Rip shrugged.

"Uh, what?"

"My name's 'Conner'." Muttered the Superboy under his breath.

"Pass your history final after your excellent adventure?" The time traveler ventured. "Help me out here, guys, I could go on forever."

.

tick-

.

At Vanishing Point, the leader of the Linear Men tapped his foot in irritation, his arms crossed over his chest. He glared reproachfully at Waverider and Rip Hunter. "So, after all that, Bart Allen just goes back to the past to continue interrupting the time-stream."

"I tried." Waverider attempted to defend.

Rip didn't care. He quit being a Linear Man a long time ago and wasn't planning on rejoining any time soon. He had another goal, his personal mission –ney quest- to find and unlock Hypertime, where all possible futures and hypothetical pasts can be found. He looked up at Matthew Ryder and said with a defiant smile, "Yep!"

.

-tock

.

As Rip Hunter had said, the Time-Sphere could travel through both time and space. So, rather than materializing in the middle of the Gotham Gazette bull-pen, they appeared on a small resort island just off the coast of California. One moment they weren't there, then the very next second they were. No transition. They were just there.

Much to the astonishment of a beach full of blinking tourists.

The hatch was lowered and Rip swaggered out, throwing his arms wide. "Here we are, Titans Tower home of the- hey, where's the tower?"

Tim and Kon exchanged a look. Then turned to Bart for explanation. The speedster just gave a sheepish shrug and muttered, 'Spoilers'. With a sigh, Tim double checked to make sure his Scarlet Pimpernel mask was still secure over his face. He may not exactly be 'Robin' at the moment, but it would still be unimaginably damaging for Timothy Drake to walk out of a mysterious bubble of unknown technology that just appeared out of nowhere in the middle of a civilian center.

He padded through the sand to Rip. "Just to confirm, this is the year 2016, right?"

"Yeah, this is- Oh, right! That hasn't happened yet!" The time traveler's fist fell into the palm of his other hand as he remembered the order of things. "Forget what I just said. Yes, this is 2016."

Bart and Kon joined them on the beach.

"Uh, guys," began the demi-kryptonian, "not that I'm a master of subtlety or anything, but we're kinda the center of attention here."

And, indeed, a crowd of bikini and swim-shorts clad on-lookers was forming around them and their time machine.

"Right!" Rip said, as if suddenly just remembering where (or perhaps more accurately when) he was. "Well, I better be going. I trust you boys can get yourselves back to where you're supposed to be, what with the super-speed and the flying and all. I got things to do, eras to go, places to see… See you in forty years. Allonz-y!"

He dashed back into the Time-Sphere and was gone. There was no fade-out, disintegration, or dematerialization, or any of the other common visual effects associated with teleportation. Just one moment he was there, then the next he was gone.

.

tick-tock

.

40 years later…

The Superman emerged from the basement of the Kent's farmhouse. He replaced the trap-door and unrolled the runner-carpet back over it. He placed Tim's half-dead (mostly dead) body in a healing pod –his healing pod, actually. It was designed for him, for someone with hybrid human-kryptonian physiology. He had no idea how it would work on Tim's completely human body. But it was the only thing on Earth he could think of and had access to that had any chance of repairing the damage to his body and saving his life.

Tim wasn't allowed to die. There was a conversation they needed to have.

Kon walked out on to his porch and sat down in one of the old wicker chairs. He heaved a heavy sigh and gazed up at the Fortress' dome. Canis Major was high over the horizon, Sirius the brightest star on the artificial sky. He watched the unmoving stars, fixed in their positions and wondered about the nature of change and of time. If events were fixed points, as unmoving as the stars he now studied. Or if they were fluid, ever changing and always moving. 'Always in motion the future is.' Unfortunately for Master Yoda, Star Wars was not the answer to everything.

From his own experience, history seemed to be immutable.

Everything seemed to happen exactly as he remembered it happening, just from the opposite point of view. Events and their effects seemed to be fixed, never changing. But then, he remembered Bart's comments about Tyron's collar and his scar. Bart had managed to change the future. Why couldn't he? Why hadn't Tim? Or, had something changed and they weren't aware of it because they were part of the resulting time-stream, not removed from it? Kon didn't know. Questions and theories like that were more Tim's territory, not his. His specialty usually tended to be smashing things.

Could he alter event if he tried?

No. He had tried to alter event, stay friends with Tim. But that backfired. He ended-up growing far closer to Tim than a mere friend. Maybe that was why the perceived betrayal of his clone, and the idea that he was so completely replaceable to him had hurt so much.

Kon cut off that trail of thought right there. He did not want to think about the offspring he killed. Not yet. Not until he could yell at Tim about it.

Instead he turned his musings back to time, time travel and altering events. He had a Legion ring. It was one of the things he'd salvaged (raided) from the Fortress of Solitude just before Clark sealed it forever. The ass. The ring had some temporal properties to it. Could he use it to travel back in time? Probably not. The moment he tried, one of the time-cops –the Linear Men- would come and bitch-slap him for it. The fasted way to summon a Linear Man was to try and mess with time.

He could summon a Linear Man!

Within moments, the Superman blurred inside the house. When he appeared outside once again, he was holding a large man's ring in his hand. Gold with a large back circle cut by a stylized L and punctuated by a star. The ring of the Legion of Superheroes. A ring from a millennium in the future. From the 31st century. Kon slipped it on his finger and though of another place in time.

Nothing happened.

Kon opened his eyes. A Linear Man he was very familiar with stood before him. "Hello, Waverider." He said. "I have a favor to ask you."

"Linear Men don't do favors." The glorified time-cop reminded him.

"Good, 'cause I'm not gonna ask you to do anything. I want you to not do something." The Superman informed him. "I don't know where you are on your personal time-line in relation to mine, but I'd like you to not travel to 2016 and bring Bart Allen back to this time."

There was a beat of silence before Waverider said, "As it happens, I was just on my way to do that. How did you now about that?" He gave the Superman one long critical stare. "You are well aware of my vows to protect the time-stream, Superman. The rules are very clear."

Kon grit his teeth in irritation at that answer. For a group of people who claimed to 'protect the time-stream' and 'never interfere', they sure did a lot of interfering and messing. He thought about Tim, laying mostly dead in his basement. How would things have played out differently if neither of them had ever come to the future in the first place? It had been Waverider that sent them here in the first place. It was all his fault. His fault! His unearthly crystal-blue eyes narrowed at the time traveler and the Man of Tomorrow considered crushing him with this TTK. He could do it. Just throw us a field around Waverider and squeeze it around him…

It certainly wouldn't be the first time he killed…

Instead, he argued, "Its not like I'm asking you to re-order time and move the start or whatever. Just leave the kids alone. I'd think it would fit in nicely with your vow of non-interference. Why'd you even bother coming here in the first place? You should know what I want."

"'Kids'?" Waverider echoed. "I'm only interested in one kid. As to why I bothered answering your little summons…" he shrugged, "…I guess I just like seeing that pretty teenaged face of yours up close."

That was it. The Superman's notoriously short patience ran out and he threw up a telekinetic field around the Linear Man, drawing it in, squeezing it tighter, intending to crush him for his insolence. But the time traveler had already gone, disappeared back to Vanishing Point, their base-of-operations in the time-space vortex. Without even an 'Allonz-y!' to announce his departure.

The Superman's perpetually young face contorted with displeasure. It seemed nothing would be changed after all.

.

tick-tock

.

40 years earlier…

Kon sat on the porch of the Kent farmhouse. Reclining in one of the wicker chairs, a bowl of candy in his lap, he waited for the trick-or-treaters to arrive. Tim sat in the other chair, board out of his skull. Bart was… somewhere. Kon gave him a bag of candy all his own and told him not to cause a scene. He and Tim weren't going to go chasing him all over the countryside like they did at the Team's Halloween party.

"Ya know, it's been six days." Kon said randomly, after the Erickson's had pilled into their truck and pulled away.

"That's a non-sequitur." Tim commented dryly.

"I just… I think we should talk about it." Continued the demi-kryptonian. "A lot happened in those two days we were in the future and I think we should talk about it."

Tim shook his head. "I don't wanna talk about it."

"Please, Tim. There's something I need you to know."

The Boy Wonder just shook his head again. "I don't want to know our future, Kon. Not our own personal futures. People who know their futures invariably end-up causing them by trying to prevent them."

"Huh?" The Superboy blinked in the dim light. The jack-o-lanterns casting odd shadows over the porch.

"But," he continued, "we should talk about what we know about the rest of the future. Bart said there's gonna be an invasion, something called Apokolips. They're gonna drill holes strait down to Earth's core, after we beat them, there's gonna be civil wars, lots of death, the collapse of world governments… heavy stuff."

Kon nodded. "Bart says his mission was to try and change the past. Do you think it possible?"

"Not likely." Tim reached over the demi-kryptonian's lap and stole a Kit Kat from the candy bowl. "But, we can analyze what we know and make the correct decisions and take the right actions that will preserve life. We already know that several members of our community took-up leadership poisons after the governments collapse."

"I don't wanna control anyone." Kon shook his head. "I'd rather use what we know to try and change our fate instead of make it happen. Maybe if you and I help Bart with his mission he'll actually succeed. We'll be a like a secret team within the Team. It'll be Just Us."

"Just Us." The Robin scoffed.

.

tick-tock

.

In a place that is not a place, at a moment that does not exist within any stream of time, Rip Hunter's Time-Sphere hovered.

He found it!

He had found it!

Hypertime.

All hypothetical pasts… and possible futures… all timelines of all parallel universes and alternate dimensions laid out before him. Each timeline branching out as all possible choices of all critical decision points created a new line, a new dimension, a new universe.

Rip hovered outside of all universes, looking at a Multi-verse.

The multi-verse. Hypertime.

He found it!

It was unlocked now. Open to any and all that had the means of reaching it and the knowledge to traverse it. The Linear Men called it a 'Pandora's Box of Time', but he didn't believe them. They were far to rigid in their views and treatment of the time-stream. Time-streams. It was plural now.

Hypertime was opened.

…And for those who knew how to listen, though out all the universes, dimensions and timelines, the sound of breaking glass –as of something thick but glassy fracturing- could be hears.

.

tick-tick-tock

.

END


End file.
